How long can fresh yeast be frozen? I've heard that I can actually buy a large box of fresh yeast cubes, freeze it, and take one out of the freezer twelve hours before using it, to let it slowly get to room temperature again.

How long can I freeze the yeast for? Will it slowly degrade, or will it just be suddenly unusable after a certain length of time?

The reason dry yeast is so popular is that it is easier to store, and is less persnickety about it than fresh yeast. Treat dry yeast right and it can last for a couple of years or more. Fresh yeast is highly perishable, and it should be frozen if you're not going to use it within a couple of days. If you're lucky, you can get significantly more time from fresh yeast by freezing it within just a day or two of getting it home.

The thing is, yeast is a living thing and you just can't know what experiences it has had before arriving in your kitchen. As such, it's impossible to predict just how much extra (past the expiration date) time you are going to get from freezing it. A month? Probably. Two months? I wouldn't count on it, but maybe. 6 months? Highly unlikely, but stranger things have happened.

If you do freeze fresh yeast, wrap it very well. Moisture and air are your enemies. Do put it in the refrigerator at least 12 hours prior to use, then let it spend the last hour on the counter. As a last step before putting together your dough, proof it. Proof the yeast by mixing it with the warm (100Fish) water called for in the recipe and, if applicable, the sugar. If there is no sugar in the recipe, give it a 1/2 tsp of flour (per loaf). Within 5-10 minutes it should be quite bubbly and growing. If it doesn't look like it's doing much, throw it away. You might as well throw away all of the yeast you have from that batch. Go to the store and get more yeast before proceeding with the recipe.

Properly stored, yeast usually dies at least somewhat gradually. You may see a slight progressive decrease in the vigor of your yeast as it gets older. Personally, once I see that I'll use it that time, but I'll get more for next time.

Anymore, fresh yeast is hardly seen except in professional bakeries. It's easy to see why. If you're going to make multiple loaves in a week, then maybe fresh yeast is worth it. Now that I have found 2 pound packages of Fleischmann's instant dry yeast (expiration almost 2 years out) at Sam's Club for $6, I think my days of messing with fresh yeast are over. (BTW 2lbs of dry yeast = about 130 loaves)

EDIT: Interestingly, Red Star disagrees and doesn't recommend freezing fresh yeast. This goes against my experience and the cynic in me wonders of their recommendation has more to do with selling yeast than anything else.


What is a good substitute for puffin? I am trying to recreate a faroese dish of braised puffin stuffed with cake.

As I live in the UK, puffin is not a meat that is easily available (if at all).

To anyone who has tried puffin or knows anything about the meat's characteristics, what would you suggest as a reasonable substitute?

My first thought would be a wild duck such as teal or mallard, but these tend to be very lean meats and would not normally suit the 90 minute cooking time suggested in the puffin recipe, which makes me think puffin meat may be quite different to how I imagine it.

I have had smoked puffin once in Iceland. It made me think of a lean, strongly-gamey/livery duck/goose breast that's been sous-vided till very tender - I remembered the grains (meat fibres) to be very fine. There was a mild sort of silky fishiness (that was masked by the smoked preparation) too, but I'm not sure if I imagined that knowing the puffin was a seabird.

I googled faroese puffin (here), and I think the 90min cooking time is meant to ensure that the batter sewn up in the bird is properly cooked -> making the puffin merely a slow-cooking vessel for the cake within.

If I had to hazard a guess, and you could forgo the aesthetic of a whole stuffed bird, then perhaps you could mimic the flavor by sousviding goose/duck breast that had been sewn up with the batter, with a bit of liver in the bag (unless your duck was already very gamey). I'm not sure how (or why) you would add that element of fishiness.


Why spend $150 on a skillet I can buy a 12" non-stick skillet at Safeway for $30. Why would I spend $150-$200 on one? What's the difference?

The primary difference between a cheap skillet and a more expensive one is going to be thickness, both of the sides and the bottom. Thick sides are not really critical, but a thick bottom can be very beneficial, promoting more even heat distribution (eliminating hot spots that can scorch food) and retaining heat. Typically an expensive skillet's bottom will be laminated with stainless steel on the outside and a really good heat conductor like aluminum or copper on the inside.

Heavier pans also resist warping, which is a common problem on thinner, cheaper pans.

Additional differences are things like better handles, ovenproof handles (not much of an issue with non-stick), and sturdier attachment of the handles. Non-stick coatings tend to be of a higher quality and more durable. Overall durability tends to be better, as a pan that is mostly stainless steel will just resist dents and dings better than one that's primarily aluminum.

And of course the more expensive ones generally look nicer, for what that's worth.

Ultimately, it comes down to whether the pan can do the things you want. If you're just scrambling eggs, a light pan will likely do you fine. If you're trying to sear a steak or brown chicken breasts, you may find your pan won't get the job done. Likewise, if you are trying to reduce a sauce in a thin pan, you may find that it boils unevenly and some parts are in danger of scorching while others haven't started to boil.

With all that said, it really is up to you to judge how much more you can spend and still feel it's "worth" the money. You can go through a lot of thin, light Safeway pans for the cost of one better one. I think it's a little wasteful, preferring to get items that will last a lifetime, but we all have our priorities. It's possible to get a pan that has many of the qualities of a $150 pan for substantially less money. A $75 pan is likely to be much nicer than the Safeway $35 special, and may be all the improvement you ever need. Your first couple of forays into pans may leave you wanting a better one each time, but you may stop upgrading long before reaching the $150 level. Going through this once with a do-all pan like a skillet is a nice way to figure out just how nice a pot you personally require before buying a whole set.


Ways to learn to season food correctly? What is a good way of learning how to season food correctly?  Are there some foods which are particularly bland until seasoned correctly that can be used to 'educate' your palate as to what is correctly seasoned?

My best recommendation is to taste as you go.  Taste the initial product...raw vegetable, ingredient from the can, bottle, etc. and then continue to taste and sample a dish throughout the cooking process to see how flavors develop/diminish and enhance one another through the cooking process.

Learning to season food is a process of educating your palate and developing a "flavor memory"

One of the most important factors is to use enough salt.  Food that is properly seasoned with salt shouldn't taste salty but will have a brighter more vibrant flavor of the ingredients that are in the dish.  Food must be cooked with salt for this to occur.  Food that is seasoned at the table will merely taste salty as the salt doesn't have a chance to dissolve and pull the juices out and help them mingle with one another as happens during cooking.

The more of the basic flavor profiles that you can incorporate the more lively and flavorful anything will be.  Even before cooking you can take a look at a recipe and "disect" its flavor profile by determining which ingredients will add sweetness, sourness, etc.  If you notice that it's heavy in one direction or another, the flavor profile of the item(s) missing will likely improve the dish.  Then it's a matter of deciding what ingredient with that flavor profile would be best to add to that particular dish.

Shameless (but applicable to the question) plug:
If you're ever in Savannah, GA I offer a class called "Flavor Dynamics".  It is focused entirely around understanding how flavor develops, what affects our perception of flavor, and how to create well rounded flavor in your food.


Counter to bitterness in soup My minestrone turned out too bitter. How can I counter it? The soup contains tomatoes, pasta, Savoy cabbage, celery, carrots, burnt sautéed garlic, thyme, oregano, salt and pepper.

Sugar seems to be a general solution, but I figured there could be better solutions for my specific case.

It may not seem intuitive but adding salt is usually a better way to reduce bitterness than adding sugar.

I would also suggest that you do not sauté your garlic until burnt as that will add a quite unpleasant bitterness. Sauté until fragrant.


How can I avoid my patties bulging in the middle? When cooking beef or turkey patties on the skillet, I often end up with them bulging in the middle. See photo below. One patty is bulging like crazy, the other is more normal.

This bulging results in the middle not making contact with the pan, and thus cooking less. Then when I go to flip the patties, the bulge makes the patties tip to one side, making the cooking even more uneven.

Sometimes I cook patties straight out of the freezer, sometimes the fridge. I think the frozen ones bulge more, but not exclusively.

What's the best way to handle this? Should I try cooking with a lower/higher temperature? Or do I need to buy a weight for the patties?

When you create the patty, make a slight indentation in the middle.  That way, the "bulge" will result in a flat patty.  If you purchase patties from the store, and cook from frozen, the only solution will be a weight or heavy pan on top as they cook.


My parchment paper soaked in oil after finish baking cookies Is this normal? I noticed that sometimes it can get really wet and I can even see the yellow liquid on my paper. However, sometimes it isn't wet at all and I can re-use my paper 2-3 times. What could be the cause of this?

Some recipes will normally leach the fat in the recipe. Some recipes just do it some of the time, other recipes are notorious for doing it all the time. Generally, it's nothing you have done wrong, fats just do that sometimes.


Suggested edible quantity/scaling of Habanero Pepper per pound of meat I would like to use habenero pepper in a chili, but would like to know how many fresh peppers / pound of chili should I use to maintain an edible chili or another what amount is safe to start with. I know there's probably not a cut/dry amount, but any experience in the matter would be greatly appreciated.  I planned on pureeing the pepper(s) and slowly adding it in and testing, but a suggested amount would be good to know since I would like to 'marinade' my meat ahead of time.

One habanero per six quarts of chili, containing approximately one quart meat, provides a solid heat that an average palate can handle. I have cooked chili on numerous occasions for groups of people and found this formula works for most people. Typically I stack it with other, lower-Scoville peppers to produce a well-bodied heat.

Other things to bear in mind:

one habanero per six quarts will not really showcase the subtler flavors of the habanero, only bring out its heat.
capsaicin is fat soluble, more fats in the chili gives you more wiggle room to add more heat. Up the meat or oil (bacon fat), up the peppers
browning your meat in the diced peppers will lock away some flavor in the meat as long as you don't stew it forever
using the bulb's flesh, rather than up by the stem will lower the capsaicin in the pepper, discard seeds and pith as well; this will allow more pepper flavor without overwhelming spiciness
some habanero peppers are weaker than others, you might seek out some that are less spicy if trying to add heat
If all you're looking for is heat, a plurality of pepper types/cultivars will yield better heat; single pepper chili can be hotter, but have a thin kind of heat as opposed to a whole-bodied punch in the jaw kind of heat


What happened to my cheese? I have had my Gorgonzola in the maturing box for 10 days turning each day it is shiny on the outside, hard and does not have any mould.

When I have had my cheese turn out as you described it was because it dried too much. One time was because I pressed it until it became like leather (oops). The other time it just wasn't covered well enough and the drying was only on the surface.

The lack of mold on your Gorgonzola could also imply that it was too dry- however that mold does require fairly specific temperature to grow well so that isn't conclusive either.


Sugar in tea better if put after boiling I am a big fan of tea. I hail from Punjab, India. I like it with cardamom and milk and water in 1:1 proportion. And I like to boil everything together (this is the way its done in majority of Indian households). Recently, I noticed that the tea tastes much better if I put sugar in my cup after pouring the tea in it, rather than boiling the sugar with everything. It tastes so fresh this way that I have altogether stopped putting in the sugar while boiling. Is there anyone who shares this taste with me and can give me some scientific explanation on what is the difference?

Yes, it would taste different-
Sugar chrystals are made of sucrose saccharose(glucose combined with fructose), if you boil sugar with an acid (milk is slightly acidic[ph 6.5-7]) your sugar splits into its monomers-fructose and glucose(invert-sugar).
Fructose fits into your taste receptors better than sucrose or fructose causing it to taste sweeter(1.73 x sweeter).


im doing kimchi but no rice wine available I made kimchi at home.and I can't find that sour taste and smell as it ferments.maybe because rice wine is not available.can I use the regular vinegar or apple cider?

You should use patience. The sour taste comes from lactic and acetic acid (more lactic than acetic) produced by the fermentation process. Kimchi is essentially "spicy sauerkraut" and both get their acidity from bacteria which are naturally present on the vegetables, aided (over other bacteria) by the right amount of salt (typically 2% by weight or slightly less), and lack of air.

The lack of air part means you should not be opening the jar to check on it for at least 6 weeks or so (and hopes that you are using a proper jar that keeps the air out with a water seal or the like.) A plain canning jar with the lid correctly tightened but not overtightened can work, but you should keep it in the dark. The bacteria eat sugars present in the vegetables and produce the acids.

Ideal temperature is a subject of debate - for speed, 70F or even 75 (which is dangerously close to too warm in my opinion) (can cut your time down to 3 weeks), for quality (but there is debate) at lower speed, 60-65 F for 6-8 weeks or more.

Per someone's mother in law from Korea, bury the jar in the garden in early winter and dig it up in spring (not one I've tried.)


Can I re-use rice if it has been used for blind baking? I often use rice when blind baking... and then I throw it out which is obviously a waste. Am I able to keep the rice and either use it again for blind baking or even to cook and eat later?

I have cooked rice that was used for weighting a pie crust with fine results.  I should have cooked some that wasn't baked to see what the difference was, but in any case it turned out fine.  Of course it may matter what temp the rice was baked at and for how long, and this could also affect the duration needed to cook the rice itself.

I have also boiled beans that were previously baked, and they turned out fine, too.


Can you make nut butters without dehydrating nuts? It's normally recommended to soak nuts, then dehydrate them and at some point in the future make your nut butters.

Now what if you want to bypass the dehydration process, I understand there will be more water (or whatever solution you used to soak your nuts in) however will it just make your nut butter slightly thinner rather than thicker?

Or is it not possible and all moisture should be removed regardless?

If you don't dehydrate the nuts, you'llend up with water and nut oil in your nut butter. This is a bad combination since it is likely to make your nut butter get mouldy very quickly.


Can I still eat this fish? I just found a couple of salmon fillets in my freezer that seem to have been there for about two years. Are they still edible, or should I bin them?

I agree with yossarian, if I question it, I chuck it.  Although in this case, the salmon probably will not harm you, it might just taste bad.  Loss of moisture (freezer burn), taking on of flavours, etc.  I wouldn't eat it because it wouldn't taste great.   My father-in-law would eat it, because you don't throw out food (his rule).  Bottom line, if it has been in the freezer for those two years straight, it won't give you food poisoning or harm you.  It's just a matter of palate.  But rest assured, it won't taste great.


What would be a good accompaniment for Ostrich fillet with Port and Blue Cheese glaze? On the heel of @ElendilThetall's question: Accompiniments for satay, I'd like to know the following.

About a year ago I found this great recipe for Ostrich Fillet, which is basically flash fried in the pan and then the leftover juices is cooked along with port and blue cheese to create a great-tasting glaze.

I haven't had the chance to make this very often, but it's an amazingly tasty, quick and easy thing to make. The problem I have is figuring out what would go well with this.

At the moment my favourite is a baked potato and roast vegetables, however I'm not so good with the roast veggies. I've also worked under the assumption that anything that goes with regular red meat, like chips, works well, but this is such a unique tasting dish that I'd really like to do something different along with it.

Unfortunately I don't really have a knack for pairing side-dishes with recipes like these, so any help would be appreciated.

I've had french fries with (beef) gravy and blue cheese, and it's delicious. However, if you want to get away from potatoes and aren't comfortable with roasting, what about doing some other sort of root vegetable mash? Like mash potatoes, but using turnips, parsnips, rutabaga, or sweet potato instead. I've tried them all and I think they're great.

As for a side veg, I'd almost want a really vinegary salad. Something astringent to cut the richness of the dish. To carry the theme, you may like a green salad with apples, walnuts, and a little blue cheese, with a vinegary italian dressing. I imagine that any kind of pickled veg would be nice, too.


Why does baking bread in a closed pot make a good crust? I just tried a recipe for bread that suggests baking it in the oven a casserole pot with a lid (Dutch oven?)
Suddenly I have a loaf with a wonderful crust which I have never managed to do with an oven or bread machine.

I'm guessing it's something to do with moisture levels - any idea why having more humidity should produce a crust? You would think that humidity would make the bread soggier.

The steam should only be used for the first part of baking. Recipes vary in opinion on how long it's best to have this steam, but the range I've seen is usually 10-30 minutes. The moist baking environment allows the outer layer of dough to remain stretchy so that you maximize "oven spring" in the first part of baking.  Steaming the dough also causes the starches on this outer layer to gelatinize, which is what leads to the crispy and nicely browned crust.  If you continue to steam through the whole baking process, this layer will not have a chance to dry out, which is what's required for it to brown and crisp up.

This article has lots of information on how to achieve a good crust.


Is there an aging process by which to "oak" meat? I was hoping there might be more ideas under this question, but I have been reading up on aging and curing meat and would like to know if there is some kind of process that, while aging the meat, can impart an oak flavor.

Sorry, any answer cannot include any form of cooking the meat (i.e. smoking it with oak chips). This is strictly confined to prep

Although I haven't found anything to this effect, particular ideas might be a barrel-aging method for meat; i.e. white oak aging for Tabasco, oaked wines or liquors.

Don't see why you can't make oaked meat.  Corned beef and salt pork have been around for a long time.  The 'corn' referred to isn't actually corn, but is rock salt.  Here is a good starting point if you want to make oaked, corned beef which doesn't require refrigeration:

http://science.howstuffworks.com/innovation/edible-innovations/food-preservation5.htm

In the above article it specifically mentions barrels for storing the salted meat.

Try google with [salting meat].

Having read some research some years ago regarding the propagation of bacteria on artificial (plastic) and natural (wood) cutting boards, and the large difference in the ability of bacteria to grow on these two mediums, wood being by far the most bacteria resistant, it would seem at least prudent and in your case, desirable, to use wood containers.  Oak barrels are available in many sizes and you should be able to order them with removable covers with a bit of inquiry.

There is plenty of oak, in many forms, commercially available.  The explosion of wineries has produced many caterers to the makers of that product.

Here is a source for oak chips:

http://www.ibrew.com.au/html/equipment/oakbarrels/oakbarrels.html

Here is another source for all types of oak, including barrels:

http://www.stavin.com/index.htm

If you don't want to make the commitment of barrels, months long curing and the space requirements for same, you could simply buy some winery chips, brine your meat in the refrigerator with oak chips between layers of meat or surrounding a piece of meat.

Have fun!


How to remove garlic smell from refrigerator/ice maker Is there a certain cleaner or chemical that will remove a lingering garlic odor from an ice maker or other food processing equipment?

About a month ago, my wife and I noticed that the ice from our fridge had a slight garlic smell and taste.  On inspection, I noticed a jar of minced garlic that wasn't completely closed in the door right under the ice maker (The ice maker is in the fridge, and has a rubber seal to the door where the ice comes out like this.)

I removed the garlic, dumped the ice, and soaked the removable ice tray/conveyer mechanism in hot soapy water.  The first few batches of ice were better, but now the smell and taste are back.

Right now we simply can't use the ice maker.  Is there a trick to garlic smell?

Also, the garlic issue with the ice maker was from garlic fumes only.  The jar did not spill, and there was never any direct contact between the garlic and the fridge.

Basically you need to turn it off, remove everything from it and then thoroughly clean it using a solution of warm water and baking soda.

Baking soda will help remove/absorb any odors that have leeched into the fabric of the fridge.

Once that is done and it has completely dried, you can restock the fridge, examining carefully anything you are putting back in for cracks, leaks or spillage that might have caused the bad smell.

Note that it is more likely that any smell is coming from something spoiled or spilled in the fridge rather than the fridge itself as refrigerators are made out of materials that are designed to NOT absorb bad smells.


What is this Austrian dish? It resembles potato croquettes? I'm searching for a recipe or just anyone who knows this dish, I think it sounds like 'rostitachen' but I can't find any recipes online or anything about it!

They are like potato croquettes filled with cheese and veg or mushrooms.

The term you are looking for is "Rösti-Taschen". Alternatives could be for example "Rösti Tascherl" (Austrian diminuitive) or "(gefüllte) Kartoffeltaschen" (denoting the ingredient).

They are sold as convenience food by various suppliers (1, 2), recipes to make them from scratch seem rather scarce (and typically in German).

The base principle is making a dough from starchy potatoes, egg, flour butter etc., wrap it round the desired filling and deep (or shallow) -fry them in fat. Breading them is optional, but can help them keep their shape. I suggest starting with a recipe for croquettes and a recipe for the desired type of filling, then combine them. Tweak as necessary.


New cast iron has gotten strange color I just got my first iron cast. I went to remove the wax and I am now in the middle of seasoning it.

So far it has gotten oil and 200°C at 1 hour, two times, and now it has a color I find strange. It looks sticky, but it ain't.

Is this normal?
And - how come are there some spots which is so clean? (see red rings)

There is a very good chance that the spacing of the markings is the same as the grate on your oven.  (at least the ones on the right side).

The left one I'm not too sure about -- it might've been something like an oven thermometer, or just where you touched it as you were loading it into the oven.

When this happens your best option I've found is to repeat the seasoning, but with the pan right-side up this time.  You'll want to make sure that you've wiped up as much oil as you can from the working area of the pan ... otherwise you'll get a thicker coating that's more likely to scrape off with use.


How do you keep ebelskivers from sticking? My sister bought me a cast iron ebelskiver pan, and I've not had much luck with each of the batches I've tried.  They always burn or stick.

I'm hopeful someone might have a tried-and-true technique for making them, and possibly a family recipe :)

There are a number of things that you may or may not be doing that is causing the problem, so any of the following "solutions" may fix it for you.  I am basing this on "burn" and "stick".

Make sure you've seasoned your cast iron.  Oil it, bake it in the oven, let it cool.  It will improve over a period of time.
Oil the pan every time you use it.
If your recipe doesn't have any added oil or butter in it, try adding some oil (Tablespoon or so) to the mix.  This would be the difference between pancakes and waffles...it will result in a little crispier exterior and less of a tendency to stick.
Turn down the heat.  If you are burning your ebelskiver you have the pan too hot.  You want the pan to reach and hold 350-375 F.  Again, think pancakes.  A drop of water on a cast iron griddle should dance for pancakes not spit and immediately evaporate.  You want the same setup.
Don't use soap and water to clean the pan.  I am assuming you know this, but for the sake of completeness I include it.  You don't want to remove the seasoning layer on the pan.
Oil the pan when you finish, before you put it away.

4 is probably the most important, since burning will mess up the oily patina you are trying to build up on your pan.  The others will all help.  As I noted in 1, your pan will improve over a period of time as the surface seasoning improves.


Gas grill: soaked wood chips vs. dry wood chips I have a gas grill and want to get some good smoke flavor in a pork shoulder I am cooking. I've done some looking around for the best way to use wood chips and have found conflicting ideas about if you should soak them or not. Does soaking the chips do something other than adding time to getting to the initial smoke?

If you're putting your wood chips directly on a fire, it's good to soak them (and that means real soaking--a few days--not an hour or two). This prevents the wood chips from actually catching fire, which can cause off flavors from combustion chemicals settling back on your food. Tastes kinda like a brand new telephone pole smells on a hot day. Tar/Creosote, and not a nice flavor.

But on a gas grill, if you've got your chips in a pan or wrapped in a fairly tight foil pouch, you needn't worry so much about the chips actually catching on fire. As long as they just smoulder, you're good to go.


Can I refreeze raspberries in cooking? I have frozen raspberries in the freezer. Can I defrost them and use them in muffins...and then freeze some of the muffins?

Yes you can.
just be careful, thawing the raspberries will make them more mushy and release more water.


How to make bubble tea - the "real" (tea-less) version? Is there a way to create the powdered flavoring? I've been unsuccessful thus far in recreating Khmer bubble tea, or the pastel-colored bubble tea one can find at many small cafes and stands.

The specific kind of bubble tea I'm looking to make uses the following:

flavored sugar powder/creamer
ice
water
tapioca pearls in syrup

Can anyone lead me to the proper way to make the flavored powder/creamer? I'm NOT looking for any varieties with fresh fruit, tea, honey, or anything else. This is an original variety of bubble tea (obviously with no real tea!) from Southeast Asia, and I can't seem to recreate it. My combinations of creamer, extracts, and sugar have failed thus far, resulting in a sugar water with little actual flavor. I'm looking for what might be a place to find the actual powders, or a possible makeup of the ingredients used. The result should be a bright color, a more creamy than watery texture, and full-bodied flavor.

A photo of the bubble tea (bright colors, hand mixed, not sealed by a machine) can be found here.

There are ways to order giant packs of the flavored powder/creamer online, but I really don't want to pay $15 for a pound of one flavor if I can create a version of it myself. Any ideas?

You can try finding the powder at an Asian grocery store.  The one I frequent has a section of powders that seem like they might be geared more toward a consumer than a restaurant.  I just checked: it's a one pound bag.  I was able to buy just the one bag, but it was a while ago, so I don't recall the price.  According to the bag, the ingredients are Non-dairy creamer, (whatever flavor - I have strawberry and almond) powder, glucose, and coloring.  Even though it says it has glucose, you're still supposed to add sugar according to the directions (and it definitely needs it).

As for creaminess, you might consider trying milk/soy milk/almond milk, etc. instead of water.  When ever I've made it, it turned out much better like that.  The directions call for extra non-dairy creamer, but the recommended amount didn't seem to be enough, so the next batch, I just made it with soy milk (no particular reason for soy over regular: I just don't have regular on hand).


How to prevent runny nose when eating spicy foods? This question is slightly less about cooking and more about delivery. Myself and some of my guests love spicy food, but get terribly runny noses when eating it. What are some tips to help prevent the runny-ness of the nose, or otherwise reduce the disgust of needing to blow the nose when eating spicy food?

Basically you can't prevent this from happening as it is a physiological (part of your body's natural function) reaction to an irritant - in this case the chemical capsaicin in the chili fruit stimulating the trigeminal nerve.  There is such a thing as building tolerance, but I don't know if this will reduce the physiological effects, or just that you have more fun when eating spicy food.

However, there are some things you can do to lessen the effects:

Capsaicin is soluble in oils - which is why it gets taken up very effectively by the tissues in and around the mouth/nose - these parts contain essentially exposed cells covered in a mucus layer.

If you want to dilute this effect to some extent, you can use products with oils in them. Milk and milk products like yogurt are especially effective  as they contain oils that are very similar to those we have in our cells. This is one of the reasons milk products like Lassi are often served with Indian cuisine.

Apparently sugar can help too - the sugar undergoes a chemical reaction with the capsaicin and results in a lessening of the heat.


Can a pre made jam be thickened into pate de fruit? I have a wonderful locally made jam and want to turn it into fruit de pate to sell alongside the jam in my market. Can I add more pectin to the jam after heating it to thicken it into a jelly?

Here is a discussion on Jam to Pate de Fruit? at eGullet Forums.
Question posted by pastryani:

Is it possible to make PDF from jam or jelly?  Jam is essentially a more fluid version of PDF, so I would think that I could either (1) boil off extra liquid from the jam until it's thicker, or (2) warm the jam and add a bit of pectin to it to thicken it.  If I were to try the latter, anyone know what amount of pectin would be needed?  Thanks!

One answer by ElainaA:

I've done (an unsophisticated) PDF from jam many times. The recipe is from one of the first candy books I bought, years ago, Weinstein's The Ultimate Candy Book. It uses gelatin: 2 envelopes of unflavored gelatin, softened in 1/3 cup. 3/4 c. granulated sugar and 1/3 c. water combined and heated to a boil. 1 c. jam or marmalade stirred in to dissolve, gelatin added, bring to a boil and cook 2 minutes. Pour into an oiled pan and refrigerate until set.
There is a very similar recipe in Ruth Kendrick's Candymaking called 'fruit jam jellies'.
I'm not sure if these are true PDF but they are good. I've made both with various types of jam or jelly. I preserve so much I have to do something with it.

Conclusion: It is indeed possible, and not hard to do.


How long does Marsala wine last, after opening? How long does Marsala wine last, after opening? In the fridge or outside? What about Marsala all'Ouvo (Marsala with added egg yolks)

Marsala is a fortified wine, that is, a wine to which extra alcohol has been added.

Therefore, you can store Marsala outside of the fridge, in a cool place (15-20 °C), away from direct light. In these conditions a bottle can sit there for several weeks/months with no obvious degradation, as you would expect for fortified wines.
Generally it is suggested to drink Marsala or similar wines, such as Porto or Banyuls, in the following 4/5 months, but I had bottles opened for a year or so and they were still good, although the flavour faded a bit.

As for Marsala all'uovo, it has pasteurized egg yolks in it, and even home-made recipes call for a pasteurization step.
In general I would store home-made one in the fridge to be on the safe side, but do not serve it too cold. Commercial ones may also have preservatives (aside from the added alcohol of Marsala) in them, and are safe to leave in a cool place for several weeks.


What's the most efficient way to juice halved lemons and limes? Between squeezers, reamers, and juicers, what's the fastest way to juice small citruses?

Limes are cheap in my area, so I'm willing to sacrifice juice per fruit if I can get the same volume faster from more of them.

I care about volume because I'm using juice in drinks.

Short of using an electric juicer, the squeeze press type of juicer is very popular for doing large quantities of citrus quickly and efficiently.  They are both fast, and squeeze almost all of the available juice, getting the best of both worlds.

These come in sizes that are best for limes, lemons, oranges, or even grapefruits.


Can I eat white vinegar if it has tons of deposits in it? I have a bottle of white vinegar on which it says that the presence of deposits is normal. My problem/concern is that there are LOTS of deposits. What are they? Is there any danger associated with eating these deposits?

There are unfiltered vinegars on the market that come with a lot of solids, and it's perfectly normal for those to have all kinds of chunky weirdness if they've sat for a little while.

Wine vinegar has a wide range of normal behaviour: it can get cloudy* or develop sediment, and that's normal. Even filtered vinegar can develop cloudiness and still be perfectly safe.

If your distilled vinegar gets cloudy, I'd worry. That shouldn't happen. Still, foreign bacteria do NOT grow well in vinegar. If your distilled vinegar is growing something, you probably know why.

Commercially produced vinegar very seldom goes bad, unless you're storing it outside on your deck, or something. If you brew your own, your mileage may vary.

*This is often a result of leaving live bacteria ("The Mother") in the vinegar. Some people think this makes it better, like live yoghurt cultures. There isn't much data either way, but it's certainly not harmful.


How do I thicken Advocaat without evaporating any alcohol? To resurrect an 1-2 year old English Christmas dark fruitcake, I removed the icing and marzipan, infused it liberally with whiskey liqueur - then cut it into cubes. I then served it with cocktail sticks and a dip of pure Advocaat. It was a great success, but the tasty dip should have been thicker like a light custard.

So the question is: How can I thicken it while still keeping 17% alcohol. If I add cornflour, I need to heat it up to thicken. But alcohol boils at 78degC which may not be hot enough for the cornflour.

Use more of the thickener that is already in the advocaat: egg yolks.

Make a custard with egg yolks and advocaat, heating gently until it thickens, but not beyond 60 C / 140 F or you risk curdling. A water bath is safer than working directly on the burner. At that temperature, the loss of alcohol due to evaporation is limited.

You can add brandy (to boost alcohol content and liquify the yolks) and sugar to adjust the taste as desired. -> those are the base ingredients for advocaat, so you can toy with the ratios and consistency without changing the flavour profile.

If you want to use corn starch, use some starch to thicken either a portion of the advocaat or some milk or cream to a consistency way thicker than desired, let cool and dilute with advocaat until the desired consistency. (Or stir the "pudding" into the advocaat.)

In this case, you shouldn't let the corn starch mix get fully cold, or you'd destroy the binding by stirting too much - as this poster learned when making pudding.


Freezing Buttercream Flowers for later use? I would like to make some buttercream cake decorations in advance and freeze them for later use (I am very slow at creating these designs) I know I can freeze them but I don't know what people put them in to not be damaged or freezer burnt in the freezer without taking up a ton of space?

Put them in the freezer on your parchment covered baking sheet for an hour. Get your Tupperware and cover the bottom with a folded paper towel. Then remove the flowers and put them in the Tupperware. Cover the flowers with another paper towel and seal the Tupperware tight.

The paper towels will help keep them container somewhat desiccated so the flowers don't get damaged by condensing ice crystals and freezer burn. I wouldn't leave them in there for too long though, because they will get burned after some time no matter what you do because of the air space in the Tupperware. Use them within a day or two if you can.


Why would I prefer carbon steel (rust prone) kitchen knife? I've seen this question and obviously carbon steel (not stainless) knives look quite bad without extra care (picture from the linked to question)

Now my question is - why face the trouble? Why would I prefer a carbon steel kitchen knife over a stainless steel one?

Carbon steel is more malleable and less brittle than stainless steel.   This means that it is easier to hone on a knife steel, to maintain an extremely sharp edge.

Some folks feel that the benefit of that sharp edge–for example, in easily slicing tomatoes, and other very fast prep tasks–is worth the compromise of more persnickety maintenance.


Using cast iron on a glass range I currently rent, and the only problem I have with the house we're in is that it has a glass-top range.  I absolutely love my cast iron cookware, and use it as often as possible.

I've heard a few reasons not to use cast iron on glass, including:

You can scratch the glass if you're
not careful
It's very easy to break the glass if
you drop it
You can melt the glass top
(mentioned in linked thread)
It can be hard to minimize hot spots

I'm not very concerned about (1) and (2), as I've already been using cast iron on glass for years with no problems (I'm very careful when I do use it).

While researching (4) I came across (3), something I had never heard before.  So, I now have a few questions:

Is melting the glass really
plausible?  This seems unlikely to
me, as a quick search revealed that
lowest melting point for common
glass types is 1500C or higher, a temperature I have no plans to reach - but
I'm not a physicist or a chemist, nor do I know what kind of glass is used to make a glass top stove.
Is a heat diffuser effective on a
glass range?  I have experienced a
few hot spots on my large (12")
skillet, and obviously when
experimenting with my two-burner
griddle.  Would a heat diffuser help, especially with the two-burner (which I've all but given up with on
glass for now because it's so
uneven).
Any suggestions for safely and
effectively using cast iron on a
glass-top range (short of being very, very careful when moving the pans)?

I also have a glass-top stove at home. So far, I really like it: the heat is very even and there is good heat transfer, provided the pan makes good contact with the surface (one skillet I have has a bit of a lip, which makes it heat more slowly).

I've slapped skillets and pots full of water around on mine, and have yet to break it. I'm probably more careful than I would be on a metal range, but it seems sturdy.

But to your points:

1) There is no way cast iron could melt the glass. Iron melts lower than does glass (1200*C vs. 1500*C), so before you manage to melt your stove, your pan will be a puddle. It may, however, be possible to deform the stove top if you let an empty pan heat for some time. I don't see why this would be more of an issue with cast iron than with any other piece of cookware.

2) A heat defuser will work fine. Don't get the kind that is designed for use with gas, but anything else should work fine.

3) The burners on my stove are smaller than my skillet, so I find I need to move the skillet around to heat the edges. Also, flat-bottomed pans and pots seem to be much more effective on the flat glass top, as conduction seems more effective than radiation here. I polish the bottoms of my pots to get better heat transfer, although this is just me being anal.

Also: cast iron can't scratch glass. Glass is much harder than iron (see this wikipedia article), glass having a 6-7 on the Mohs scale, iron having a 4.


Why are fresh eggs useful when cooking meringue I was always told to use fresh eggs when making meringues but was never told why.

From my own personal experience, I've always found using aged egg whites made fabulous meringues. Aging the whites in a covered bowl removes some of the water content for a more stable aeration.


How should I store bolognese sauce prep? I want to make a huge batch of bolognese ragu sauce, and would like to do some of the prep the night before. I'm going to finely chop these ingredients:

Beef
Pork shoulder
Carrots
Celery
Onions

...and the day after they will be fried and turned into sauce.

How should I store these chopped ingredients overnight? Will just putting them in bowls with cellophane over do? Are there any of them that probably shouldn't be prepared the day before?

Short version: If it's only overnight, and you seal the containers reasonably well, you'll be okay prepping any of those ingredients ahead of time and storing them in the refrigerator overnight.

I often leave onions in the fridge when preparing a recipe that calls for only half an onion, or if I've decided to use less than I prepped, or if I'm making a salsa and I chop the onions before realizing I don't have as many tomatoes as I thought, etc. If you don't cover them they will dry out a bit, but overnight doesn't do much harm; I find if they're tightly covered, whether in a glass bowl with plastic wrap or a sealed plastic storage container, they're just as good the next day.

The same goes for carrots and celery. I'm sure there's been a time when I prepped too much mirepoix; but generally speaking, if you have a cut carrot or stalk of celery in the fridge, it doesn't suffer too much overnight. More than a day and it starts to dry out; the cut surface of the carrot will start to look like the end near the tops, and possibly split. The celery dries out more quickly, as it's got higher water content and more fragile structure to begin with; more than a day and it'll lose its color, eventually turning limp and yellow, starting from the cut end.

For the veggies, the way to keep them freshest is with a tight seal and as little air as possible. You could put them in a zipper bag and squeeze out any extra air but I think a reasonably-sized glass bowl, covered tightly with plastic wrap and placed in the fridge, is good enough for 12-24 hours. If you don't have room in the fridge, you'll probably still be okay, and they may even be less prone to drying out (the air in your fridge is very low-humidity; sometimes you have a special compartment for which the humidity can be adjusted, for fruits and vegetables).

I have less experience prepping meat ahead of time, unless I'm brining or marinading it; in those situations, the meat's covered by a liquid that contains preservatives (salt, acid) that help prevent it from spoiling, and it's always refrigerated. Keeping it cool and minimizing the contact with air or contaminants is the main thing. If you only have enough room in the fridge to store some of your prepped ingredients, use it for the meat. In this case I'd say a zipper bag with the air squeezed out is the clear way to go; meat is malleable and you'll be able to get nearly all of the air out, which means it'll store almost as well as it did before you chopped it into pieces.

The thing to remember about ground, chopped or cubed meat is that anything that contaminated the outside surface of the original cut is now mixed evenly throughout. This is why it's generally safer to order a steak rare than it is to order a hamburger rare; the center of the steak hasn't been exposed to as much of its environment as the center of the burger, during handling and storage. So even if you refrigerate your prepped meat in a sealed container with the air evacuated, effectively storing it just as well as when it was in the original packaging and in one piece, I wouldn't expect it to keep the same effective "use by" date because it's been disturbed and mixed and exposed to the environment of your prep area. You're better off doing this with a cut that you purchased recently, which hasn't been refrozen and isn't nearing expiration.


Melting sugar on creme brulee with blow torch Whenever I try to melt the sugar on top of a creme brulee with my kitchen blow torch, I find that the sugar takes forever to discolour even slightly, let alone melt. Eventually isolated patches of sugar start to burn. At this point I usually stop as I don't want to eat burnt sugar.

I hold the torch so the flame ends just above the sugar, and I move the flame around constantly.

What I end up with is sugar that isn't totally melted into a nice layer, but is still granular but somewhat stuck together. The texture isn't right at all - I want that smooth layer of sugar.

What am I doing wrong?

The technique for creating a proper layer of melted sugar on your creme brulee involves three important elements:

After you add the sugar, gently swirl the ramekin to create smooth layer of sugar. You don't want it too clump or be uneven.
Gently 'kiss' the sugar with the tip of the flame, moving the flame around to heat evenly, just until the sugar starts to flow.
Hold and rotate the ramekin to cause the melting sugar to flow around the cup and form an even layer.

Your goal is to distribute the heat, and sugar, evenly and smoothly around the top of your custard.

The technique to use is easier to pick this up by seeing it rather than reading about it. Alton Brown did a segment on Creme Brulee on Good Eats where he demonstrates the technique.

(if the link fails, you can Google "Alton Brown Creme Brulee on You Tube")


Why does Swiss Cheese have holes? I've always enjoyed eating cheese. Just getting that out of the way. I've never quite figured out why Swiss Cheese has holes! I mean, I can understand different shapes like round, square, triangular - though I can't quite fathom why swiss has holes, how they get there, etc

Those are called "Eyes" by cheese makers. The appear when bacteria convert lactic acid into propionic acid and carbon dioxide, or metabolise citrate.

These bacteria occur in dairy products, though they can also be added to the curd to get the characteristic eyes. See for example Propionibacterium freudenreichii on Wikipedia.


Why is ground beef red on the bottom also? Recently, I have been buying ground beef in one pound packages that is red throughout. Last evening I bought a 6 pound bulk package (because of the significant savings) from the same store. The meat was red on all surfaces including underneath, but grayish brown throughout the middle. Is the Styrofoam piece on the bottom of the packaging air permeable also?

Because oxygen is still carried through the packaging, but it doesn't travel very far in the meat. This is normal.


Can you be harmed by staring at induction stove cook top? While it's on its beaming red and looks menacing . Is there any harm that can happen to your eyes while it's on looking at it other then drying out eyes from heat?

No, your stove is fine to look at.

If it is actually an induction stove, then the red would just be a light to let you know it's on. The actual induction heating won't make the cooktop glow red.

You might just have an electric glass/ceramic cooktop, though, in which case the heating will make it glow red, but it's still safe. Things glowing from heat are just emitting red and infrared light, pretty much the same as some glowing coals from a fire, not at all harmful to look at.


Is it good to store a salt block with silica packs? We recently started using an Himalayan salt block.  We cleaned it as per the directions, and the storage said to scrub it, dry it, let it air dry, and store it in an airtight container.

It seems clear that these storage directions are intended to make sure we keep the block as dry as possible.  I thought it would be even better to toss a silica pack or two into the airtight container, since silica packs help keep whatever is in their container dry.  The instructions certainly don't suggest doing this, presumably because silica packs aren't common items to keep around.  (If it matters, I scavenged this one from a bag of jerky we had eaten.)

Is there anything wrong with this idea?  My understanding was that the silica packs keep their silica all inside the packet, and draw the moisture into the packet, and that it shouldn't interact with the salt block at all, but there's a fine line between food chemistry and magic for me.

Should I toss a silica packet in to the container that has my salt block?

Depending on your climates humidity, if its too humid salt works like a big silica pack. It absorbs moisture, and you might get liquid salt runnoff. If you live in Denver Colorado, you could probably store it on your porch.

General suggestions are to wrap salt blocks in plastic wrapping.

Therefore if you double up that with an airtight container you can store it indefinitely.

Silica gel is also a form of porous sand that stores moisture and does not harm your salt block in any way. The two compounds are also separated by the silica gel packet wrapping.


Can anyone identify this chocolate? A recent date left this for me to find...a surprise gift, how sweet! I'd love to know just how sweet :)

It's 1 3/8 inches, 3.5 cm thick. The larger piece weighs 143 grams or 5 ounces.

It tastes pretty good (but I am definitely no connoisseur) and it's certainly in the semi-sweet/bittersweet range.

I just discovered one more possible hint, WinCo Foods sells chocolate block pieces in their bulk food section, there are WinCos in my date's home state of Idaho. They carry both what they call dark chocolate and bittersweet chocolate.

This Chocolate is Van-Leer semi sweet. It was an old American chocolate manufacturer that was recently purchased by Callebaut. It does have a distinct slab style. This is available in the bulk section at Winco.

Here's a picture:

You can also order it online here


Are glass jars from the supermarket oven safe? I recently discovered from  the working class foodies video on french onion soup that mugs are oven safe, or at least their mugs and my mugs seem to be by experimentation. I also happen to be one of those people that saves pickle, salsa, etc jars to store food, so I was wondering if these are oven safe too.

The jars in question are trader joes corn and chili salsa, and the bottom has the following symbols and numbers on them, which might hint as to the qualities of the glass.

So, are these jars oven safe? I currently bake my french onion soup at 450°F, but I might want to broil it as well to brown the cheese.

Short answer: They're probably not safe.

Unlike "microwave safety", there isn't a safety risk in contaminating the food contents of the jars due to heating in an oven; in this case you just run the risk of the jars breaking.

I am not sure what the symbols on the bottom of your jar mean; (see edit below) from what I understand—unlike plastic resin identification codes—there isn't a standard set of symbols for glass.  Those symbols likely represent the manufacturer, production date, and patents.

Unless glass is processed in a special way, it is prone to breaking when it goes through rapid temperature changes.  Therefore, if your glass is run-of-the-mill soda-lime glass (which is extremely likely), and if you were to put it from room temperature directly into a 450°F oven, the shock of that rapid temperature change would likely crack it.  Furthermore, even if you were able to gradually heat it up to 450°F without it cracking, it would likely crack even as it naturally cools down.  In order to try and ensure that the glass doesn't crack you'd have to both gradually heat the jars up and then very gradually step the oven temperature back down to room temperature.

If you want to use glass, your best bet would be to use something like Pyrex.

Even Pyrex, which is explicitly designed to be oven safe, can't withstand the direct heat of a broiler, though.

Edit: I believe the symbol on the bottom of your jars reads "A.G.C." surrounded by the outline of the state of Arkansas.  This implies that your jars were made by the Arkansas Glass Container Company.  I believe the numbers indicate the model number, which appears to be this jar.  AGC unfortunately don't have anything on their website listing the oven safety of their glass.  If you're really interested, you could try contacting the manufacturer.


Filtered or non-filtered soymilk maker? In the process of making soymilk for drinking it, using it as diary replacement in vegan cooking or preparing tofu, one have to strain the mixture to remove the okara. There are lot of soymilk makers available. Some (like the Soyabella) include a filter so that every steps of the process are automatized. Yet, the most recent makers like the Soyapower PLUS are filter-less, which means one have to filter the milk at hand with a strainer.

Why do they removed the filter in the recent soymakers ? Is it to make the cleaning easier, or does it improve the quality to boil the milk together with the okara ?

I have an old SoyaQuick (mine has a filter, newer models don't), and I think it was largely a cleaning concern. The tiny perforations in the filter clogged very easily, and the instruction manual had a whole section of bizarre tips for cleaning it (soak it in bleach! squeeze a soapy sponge to one side to force the suds through!)

There's also some marketing speak about "leaving in the perfect amount of pulp for your taste!" but that sounds like bull to me.


Medium sauces versus Mild! I can never remember which is hot. NOw i have a medium enchilada sauce in my recipe and need to cool the heat way down... help! How do I make my meal so that my child will be able to eat it. She does not like spicy.

Mild is the opposite of hot. Medium is in-between. If the sauce ends up too hot for your child, try a dollop of sour cream or plain yogurt.


How to make/preserve popcorn so that its taste and texture doesn't deteriorate within a day or two? I really love popcorn and usually pop it on the stove and eat it right away. However I'd like to make it ahead to save for snacks at work. I tried this once before and the kernels got a bit stale tasting, not very crisp. Are there any techniques for making popcorn that can hold up for a day or two, and how long would it last?

Unless you coat the popcorn (with caramel, etc), I know of no way, other than SAJ's vacuuming idea, which is quite a good one, imo.


How to make kosher roux? I am looking to make a kosher bechamel made from almond milk. What kind of fat should I use in the roux? Margarine? Regular veggie oil?

You can use any fat at all in a roux, including animal fats like suet and schmaltz. With a roux, all you're doing is toasting the flour to get rid of the raw flavor, and using the fat to make sure it doesn't clump up. The older, less sophisticated beurre manie technique involves kneading flour into cold butter, throwing knobs of it into your boiling liquid, and skimming any scum that floats up. The toastiness of roux is great, but as long as there's enough well-incorporated fat to keep the flour from clumping, your sauce will thicken just fine.

So which fat you use— dairy or meat avoidance aside— depends entirely on the flavor profile you're working with. If you use a butter substitute such as margarine, remember that like butter it contains a double-digit percentage of water: I was taught to let that cook off first or you'll end up with some early seizing, but it doesn't seem to affect the end-result too much. If you're not using a fat which contains water, you can use about 15% less fat than you would butter... but the results will be just fine if you want to use the same amount... your mixture will just have a little more fat.

Your other easy option is to use a cornstarch slurry as a thickener, but of course, that will change the texture.

As an aside, if you're not dead-set on having a bechamel, you might enjoy a veloute in its place. It would use any broth or stock in place of your almond milk. Nothing wrong with almond milk, but the broth/stock might add a little depth. A suet-roux beef stock veloute sounds like a pretty delicious sauce to me. Veloute made with fish stock is divine in the right context.

Happy cooking!


What happens when I boil 2 pots of pasta in the same water back to back? I had to make 2 pots of pasta back to back. I did a pot of spaghetti as usual. I add a little vegetable oil always, salt, and I throw about 5 peppercorn seeds in the water, bring it to a boil, then add the boxed dry pasta.

Well, this time, when done, I took the spaghetti out of the boiling water (with tongs and a sieve. It was perfect. I then decided to do the linguini in the same boiling water. Was this a mistake? I just added a pinch more salt, and let it cook. When I thought it would be done, it was a little weird. Maybe chewy? I don't know if I'm just being paranoid and should just let it cook more.

Did I do a big pasta faux pas?

There should be no issue with doing this, restaurants often do this; the only thing that will happen is that the water will have more pasta starch as you cook more pasta in the same pot.  Obviously, basic food safety rules apply here - you need to keep the water out of the "danger zone", but otherwise it should not be a problem.

This could be a good thing as far as helping the pasta bind to the sauce, but will possibly make the pasta a bit more sticky if you don't sauce it right away.


Baking and a rotten egg was cracked into mix :( I was mixing together my batter for gluten free cinnamon rolls (aka- using really expensive flour!), I broke an egg into the mix and the yolk looked almost like it was hard boiled... it had not been! The white looked normal. I immediately took it out as best I could (got all the yolk for sure, but I’m sure some white remained). Is my entire batch no good? It will be baked at 350 for 45 minutes, does that make a difference?

Yes, the whole batch is unusable. Baking doesn't change anything, food safety rules don't foresee turning unsafe food back into safe.


How many milliliters is a "pinch?" I found a recipe in English that mentions a "pinch" of something. English is not my first language, and Google shows that "pinch" has many meanings. Do I have to pinch it with my fingers, or can i find a suitable amount of milliliters to use?

A 'pinch' is the amount of powder/whatever that can be trapped between one's thumb and fore finger.


Why do I have lumps in my caramel? (NOT crystallized sugar.) There are a lot of caramel questions. Hopefully I'm not repeating anyone...
I've made caramel sauce several times with the recipe from Sally's Baking Addiction. (But using a different beginning procedure: Dissolve sugar in ~1/2 cup of water, not stirring. Put the lid on for a few minutes to clean the sides. After that it's the same.) For some reason, though, whenever I make it I end up with lots of tiny lumps suspended in my caramel. As I mention in the title, these lumps are not little sugar crystals. I've had my caramel crystallize before, and this is very different. They're soft, for one thing, and so I'm not sure what's happening.
At first I thought the little lumps were just air bubbles. That's what they look like. But they actually have some body to them. It's almost like I have tiny bits of cooked egg or something (which is obviously impossible.) They have a gelatinous quality. So my guess is that the cream is doing something weird? Flavor is good, thickness is good, everything is good except these stupid little lumps.
Does anyone know what's happening, and how I can make it stop...? I'm about to take an immersion blender to the mess and let God sort it out.
EDIT/UPDATE: So... I now have a theory that I tend to get my caramel so dark (more of a crimson/burnt sienna than an amber. Probably around 380F) that some of the dairy solids in the butter (maybe even the cream?) cook/coagulate as soon as I add it, leading to those gelatinous lumps. I haven't had the time (or a good reason) to try cooling my syrup with some water before I add the butter yet, but as I said in the original question, this definitely isn't sugar crystallization, and it's been a persistent problem. When my mom's made the recipe before, she didn't have the problem, but she's also terrified of burning her caramel and tends to add the butter much, much sooner.
I've noticed brown specks when I've made chewy caramels and toffee as well, so I'm wondering if cooked and browned dairy solids are my whole problem here.

I have failed many times to make that kind of recipes. They contain false direction, especially when it comes to melt the sugar.

Here is a quote which helps me. It's not accurate but you'll get the idea.

  The thing to do when you want caramel is to do nothing

In the recipe you provide, the author stirs the sugar while it cooks. That's a bad idea.

Sugar has a very complex crystal structure and it's not very stable when you heat it. Thus if you disturbed the crystals, you'll end up with lumps. During the last step (the one with the cream), it will emphasize those lumps.

So you need to refrain to stir during the melting step. If you have sugar sticking on the side of the pan, you could use a brush with some water. And again, do not stir.


Can I make cornbread without flour? I am in the UK, but acquired a taste for cornbread from previous visits to the US (it is almost unknown here).

I’ve successfully made cornbread in the past and have quite a lot of cornmeal in my kitchen. However, at this time of lockdown, with folks getting bored and baking at home, it seems to be quite hard to get hold of flour; stocks are running low. Every recipe I can find online for cornbread involves using (roughly 50:50) flour with cornmeal, usually all-purpose.

I’d like to minimise the amount of flour I use. Is it possible to make cornmeal with no, or very little, flour? How little can I get away with and how should I amend the rest of the recipe?

As far as I know, generally the problem with corn based doughs is cohesion.

Cornmeal only mixes tend to be very crumbly and the resulting consistency weak, hence the addition of flour to increase gluten content and help improve agglutination.

That being said, upon a little research there seem to be plenty of flourless recipes around, originating more towards the south of the United States where apparently it is more common to use less flour.

A quick Google search will probably yield lots of recipes for no flour cornbread.

Most just seem to compensate with the inclusion of additional eggs, more sugar, milk or other ingredients to help with cohesiveness.

You may also not adjust at all and simply assume the fact that you will end up with a crumblier consistency and "sandier" texture. It is mostly a matter of personal preference, so if this is not an issue give it a try if you have a chance. Maybe you enjoy the slightly stronger flavor and coarser feel.

In Portugal we have a traditional type of cornbread called Broa which is closer to an actual bread, rather than a quickbread or cake. It is made with cornmeal, combined with rye or other cereals, and the ones considered higher quality generally have less wheat flour. It generally tends to be a heavy bread with dense consistency, dark brown crust with a cracked appearance and a slightly crunchy feel.


How should I alter a chocolate cake recipe to make plain/flavoured cake? I have a really good chocolate cake recipe. It's so good that I want to use it as a base for all my cakes. How do I alter this recipe to make different cakes like vanilla, lemon, coconut, etc.?

I tried converting it to a vanilla cake last night, but it came out too floury. All I did was replace the cocoa with flour.

Here are the recipe ingredients.

2 cups raw sugar
1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup cocoa
1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 cup coconut milk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon almond extract
1 cup boiling water

There are several aspects of the chemistry of the chocolate cake being converted to a white cake that are not covered in the existing answers.

Fat content of cocoa powder

You cannot simply replace the cocoa powder with flour, because it compared to flour, cocoa powder:

Contains more fat (about 10-12 percent by weight, for grocery store brands; more for some premium brands up to about 25%)
Is more acidic
Is far, far more flavorful (okay, that part is not desired in a white cake)

You should use slightly less flour than there was cocoa, to avoid adding flour by weight equivalent to the fat in the original recipe which would throw the balance off.  I would suggest a half cup plus 2 tbls of flour instead of 3/4 cup of cocoa as a starting point.

Flavor balance

With the astringency of the cocoa removed from the recipe, the flavor balance may be too sweet.  You might want to try reducing the sugar by about 1/4 cup - 1/2 cup.

Acid and Leavening

The original recipe contains both baking soda (which requires an additional acid from another ingredient) and baking powder as leavening.

When you remove the cocoa, you are removing the acid that the baking soda was intending to react with.

Therefore, you need to remove the baking soda, replacing it with baking powder which brings its own acid.  You might need a slightly larger amount, as part of the weight of baking powder is the acid, so there is less leaving per unit than with baking soda.  I would suggest an additional 1/2 teaspoon as a starting point.

Boiling water

The boiling water is specifically intended, I infer from experience with many chocolate cake recipes, to bloom the flavor in the cocoa.  When you remove the cocoa from the recipe, you remove the need to use boiling water to enhance the chocolate flavor.

Furthermore, the reason water is used rather than milk or another liquid is to interfere less with the perception of chocolate flavor.  Therefore, you may choose to use another liquid like milk or additional coconut milk which will enhance the flavor and tenderness of your final cake.

Vegetable Oil

Vegetable oil is chosen in this recipe to avoid interfering with the flavor from the cocoa.

You may continue to use it, or you may find that butter or even coconut oil give a more agreeable flavor for the final product you are creating.

Method

With all of the above changes, there will no doubt be some changes to the method.  Since you have only listed the ingredients, and not the actual steps, it is harder to be specific here.

However, what will be left is a fairly standard sponge cake, so should modify the steps to the standard creaming method:

Sift the dry ingredients together; combine the wet ingredients other than butter and sugar
Cream the butter and sugar(s) together
Add in the eggs one at a time, beating until smooth.
Add the dry mix alternating two or three times with the wet mix, beating each time for 30 seconds or so
Beat one or two minutes longer to develop structure

Flavorings

For coconut, using coconut oil in lieu of vegetable, and more coconut milk in lieu of water, and adding coconut extract should do the trick.  The recipe should also be able to carry a small amount of shredded coconut if you choose, although that will change the texture.

For vanilla, try butter and milk instead of oil and water.  Add vanilla extract.

For lemon, start as with vanilla, and add lemon zest to the batter (and maybe lemon extract), and possibly, should you choose, a touch of yellow food color.  I would not add lemon juice as it has a profound effect on the chemistry; instead I would make a nice lemon icing or glaze that has the tartness.

Conclusion

Despite all of the above, I would not try to convert a recipe that is specifically designed for chocolate to a white cake; too many aspects of the cake will change.  Instead, I suggest finding a truly outstanding white or yellow cake recipe to use.


How can I stop the cooking in my chicken and noodle soup? I usually enjoy my chicken noodle soup right after cooking it to perfect noodle doneness. Most of what I cooked goes into the fridge. My problem is that while I'm waiting for the left-over soup to cool off, the noodles get overcooked. How could I prevent that?

I don't want to put the warm soup in the fridge or freezer, and eating the just-done portion more al-dente isn't an option.

The noodles are wide egg noodles, and there's about 2-3 l water in the soup.

rfusca already gave very good suggestions for the literal question from the title. However, you can also address your problem the other way round.

First, cook the soup until your noodles are al dente (but will become just right while cooling at a normal speed). Take the big pot of soup off the heat.

Second, take a small pot, and fill it with just one portion of soup per eater. Put it on the heat, and cook until the noodles are done. (Alternatively, put the single portions into porcelain bowls and microwave until the noodles are ready - it spares you washing an additional pot, but I wouldn't nuke a good soup for no reason).

Third, eat your cooked soup portions and let the big pot of soup slowly cool on its own.

Fourth, freeze the soup from the big pot. Finis.

Note that from a food safety point of view, you are better off with flash cooling the soup. But what I outlined here is probably much simple and hassle-free. Plus, 2-3 liters of soup minus a portion or two should spend less than the magical 4 hours in the danger zone while cooling. If you are doing this with a very big pot of soup and feeding lots of people, you should probably prefer a rapid cooling.


Which rice is best for rice pudding? I live in a small town in Argentina and there is no special rice available for cooking with milk, like I am used to buy in Germany.

Which sort of rice is best for cooking with milk. It should get really soft while cooking.

You don't say what type of rice pudding you want to make, and wikipedia lists quite a few. I'm assuming you want to make a traditional british baked rice pudding in this answer, but if not then it might be useful to clarify what you want to make, as many cultures make different rice puddings and use different rices to make them.

I think you can make rice pudding with any short grained white rice. Traditional 'pudding rice' is just a cheap short grain rice, but you could use arborio, the traditional short grain risotto rice or sushi rice and get a similar result. This article outlines attempts at using a few different rices, with varying degrees of success.

The key to getting it soft when cooking is probably just a function of having enough liquid. Too little liquid and it'll stay firm, more than enough and it'll go soft & squidgy. Starchy rice (which white short grain typically is) will give you the sticky, gloopy rice pudding consistency.

This question might also be useful


Can I successfully bake previously-frozen bread dough? I prefer my bread freshly baked (who doesn't?), but my mixer prefers kneading two loaves at a time to just kneading one. I have tried to freeze the second loaf before baking it, but when I thaw it, it does not rise well before baking. I've tried thawing it entirely in the refrigerator and then letting it rise on the counter, but that did not seem to work. Does anyone have a good technique or suggestion for this?

Traditional dough will not freeze well.  You have to par-bake it.

In the US, the “freshly baked” bread sold in most supermarkets is par-baked dough.   This is risen dough, which is then baked for 70 to 80% of the usual baking time, cooled, frozen, and shipped to the supermarket, where it is baked again until golden.  You could do the same.

A par-baked baugette is a bit denser than a traditional one.  Freezing the dough before baking it kills most of the yeast preventing it from working during the first stages of baking.


How to use rehydrated Kombu after making Dashi? To prepare a Miso Soup the first step is the preparation of the Dashi.
The Dashi will most certainly contain Kombu. Can the rehydrated Kombu be used in the Miso? What kind of preparation does the rehydrated Kombu need, before consuming?
Is the Kombu actually used in Miso in Japan or other sea weeds (such as Wakame) are used?
Is there any other used of the rehydrated Kombu from the Dashi preparation?

You can chop it and eat it or add to your soup, stir fry, dry and crush into a powder to use as a condiment, etc.


Cellophane lids on jam I've made some apricot jam and I'm happy with the consistency.  I heated the jars and filled them with hot jam. Unfortunately the jam cooled before I got the lid on.  Can  I put a cellophane lid on cold jam?

If you want the result to be shelf stable, you need to follow a proper procedure to either process the jam in a water bath or in a pressure cooker. Just placing the lids on the jam (either hot or cold) is not considered safe. Your jam is fine if you want to store it in the refrigerator, but not otherwise.


Why throw away so much sourdough starter? Tartine Book no. 3 this is the first time I've use this site to ask a question:

I've been meaning to bake some sourdough bread for a long while. I've been just hung up on the recipe for the starter.
A book I'm currently using for inspiration says to do roughly a 1:1 ratio of water to flour of 300 g warm water and 315 g flour. Eventually, just before feeding the starter, it calls to "Transfer 75 grams of the starter to a clean bowl and discard the remainder of the starter." Later it then asks you to continue this process, discarding the sourdough and leaving 75 grams.

When I first read this I had to blink. Discard 540 grams of sourdough starter?!? What a waste!

Why is this book telling me to do the in the recipe? This seems incredibly wasteful. I don't understand why I couldn't just keep feeding it with a 1:1 ratio.

The book is TARTINE, Book No. 3 By Chad Robertson.

At the beginning, you are throwing out a lot because you are just feeding the culture. You're just seeding the growth medium (fresh flour and water) with the young culture, so you want to be sure that the ratio of food to culture is appropriate.

Once the culture is established, you don't have to throw out any, but you do have to keep feeding it. This generally means that either you throw out a little, or have to feed it a ton. At the bakery where I work, we use so much starter that we don't throw any out. We're left with little enough at the end of the day that we just add fresh flour and water.

The ratio of starter to fresh flour and water (and ratio of flour to water) are used to control the culture. Different strains grow better at different levels of hydration, and leaving more of the already cultured starter in when you feed it can leave in more of the "waste products", like acids, which contribute to flavor.


How can I get even heat from consumer gas stovetop burners? I have a 5 burner modern style gas cooktop (KitchenAid), 4 in standard positions, one big double in the center.

4 of the burners are all the standard circular shaped and seems most of their heat just goes to the outside edge of a circular pot/pan. I've lost a few non-metal accessories getting used to it.

Most professional models use multiple circles or cross shapes that put heat in the center as well as out sides.

Is there method or part to use that would get more heat into the pot bottom?

So this may not be exactly what you were looking for, but I purchased one of these cast iron heat diffusers to help "tame" the heat from the cheap-o gas stovetop in my college apartment. You have to take the time to heat it up, but it helps distribute the heat evenly.

Cast Iron Heat Diffuser on Amazon


Small batch of sauerkraut smells yeasty As an experiment, for my first attempt, I'm making a small batch of sauerkraut. Small like less than 1/3 of a head. Its setup is pretty amateur, no professional airlock. Anyway, it's been going for a little while, less than a week, and I wanted to taste a little bit to see how it was going. It is starting to taste a little bit sour, which I think is good, but also has a very noticeable yeasty taste and smell. I don't see any visible signs of yeast, no kahms yeast film on the top or anything(and the cabbage is, as far as I can tell, completely submerged). I plan to leave the kraut for longer before calling it "finished", and to be entirely honest, I don't really know what sauerkraut is ideally supposed to taste like. Should this yeast thing be worrisome?

Well, now you've increased the odds of a variety of things you don't want, because you opened it up "to try some" and never had it all that well sealed (according to what you wrote - I don't use "professionally separating fools from money" airlocks either, but I seal my kraut jars to keep air out, and I leave them that way for a good 6 weeks, so I have no idea what it tastes like at one week, other than it would be horribly underdone) so it's been exposed to oxygen, which promotes a variety of spoilage in kraut.

If the cabbage is fully submerged, seal it as well as you can (a properly tightened canning jar lid works, plastic wrap and a rubber-band can also work) and put it away in the dark for 5 weeks at 50-65°F before you revisit it.

I stepped up the low-budget airlock game on the most recent batch and put 4 sealed canning jars into a plastic bucket - it catches the mess if I improperly oversealed a jar (didn't happen, but I'm cautious that way) and also makes a secondary containment for carbon dioxide to help keep oxygen out.

I had one jar earlier that was prepped with insufficient weights available, so it got some kahm yeast on top when the cabbage rose above waterline. Being properly sealed from air, it only got kahm yeast, and that was easily removed with the top layer of kraut when it was done. I specifically opted not to bother trying to deal with it when first seen,  since that would allow air into the jar. I have taken more care with weights since.

Edit: You can either add (if you have space) or replace some of the current liquid with (if you lack space) plain carbonated water (which will release carbon dioxide and help flush air out of the container) to reduce the impact of having opened it, so long as you then cobble up some sort of airlock.


How can I safely store or dry wet sugar? I recently transferred a batch of home-made vanilla extract to a smaller bottle. I shook out the vanilla beans left in the original bottle into a container with white granulated sugar as there was a lot of extract and seeds left on them. The extract is vodka-based and contains about 35% ABV.

The end result is that this container of sugar is completely soggy and wet now, and I'm wondering how I can safely store it. From what I've read, dry sugar has an indefinite shelf-life because it is hygroscopic, creating a dry environment where nothing bad can grow. This is obviously no longer the case here. High sugar content seems to play a role in the shelf life of fruit preserves but the bigger factor there is probably sterilisation before canning.

How can I safely dry out this wet sugar mixture?

Should I toss it if it's been sitting at room temperature (with a fine mesh top) for 24 hours?

Is storing sugar when wet a Really Bad Thing?

Will the alcohol inhibit the growth of anything that might survive the high sugar content?

You shouldn't have any problem. Bacteria need sufficient water to survive, a few drops wetting the sugar are not sufficient for them. As far as I'm aware, even old-style jam (1 part fruit to 1 part sugar, boil some of the water out) is shelf-stable.

Even if you are close to the limit, it's still not too concerning. The good news is that, when you preserve something with sugar, and get a bit too low on the sugar, it's not bacteria that colonizes it first, it's mold. The mold can be toxic on its own - but it's nicely visible.

So, as long as you don't have a sticky mass and see mold growing on it, the sugar should be safe. It can be hard to work with though - we have an old question on getting lumped-together brown sugar out of the container, if you need it.


Using charcoal in kettle grill I learned that in kettle grill the coal should be placed on one side of the grill and meat on the other side.

What is the advantage of this method against grilling on direct fire?
Adding a water pan is recommended. Does it really make a difference?
When should I cover the grill and why?

Well, the answer in each case is really "it depends."

Indirect grilling is a way to reduce the radiant heat from the coals reaching your food, slowing cooking. It's useful for cooking thick, dense foods where the radiant heat might overcook the outside before the inside is cooked through. This isn't desirable for thin foods, where you want to brown the outside of the food while the inside cooks-through.

I'm not sure what the water might be for. I suspect that, because of water's very high specific heat, some folks might believe that it helps evenly heat the air in the grill. Only problem with that is that is your grill has an outlet, either in the form of a vent in the cover or a chimney on larger models. Water vapor is just going to escape. What does stay in the grill is just going to condense on the inner surface of the grill and run down the sides and drop onto your food. Old soot isn't a flavor I want imparted to my ribeye.

Covering the grill keeps hot air near your food, helping to cook the food by convection. Again, this is for helping to cook through foods that might be burned if cooked only by radiant heat.


How to pressure can grilled paprika I would like to pressure can grilled paprika, which is a traditional Bulgarian preserve and looks like this:

Normally this is done by grilling the paprika on very high heat for a short amount of time, after which the skin is removed and the paprika are put in a jar and topped with the juice and maybe water. The closed jar is then water bath cooked for 30-45min. The result is great and not mushy.

Until now, I have always canned them without a pressure canner, but now I want to switch to a pressure canner in order to alleviate the danger of botulism, even though the produce is skinned, to be on the safe side.

Since there are no official recommendations for canning already cooked / grilled paprika, which recipe should I choose? Will the end result be mushy, because of the higher temp? Or will it be similar to what I have done in the past with a water bath? How long should I put the jars in the pressure canner? I have different sizes of jars, but most are about 125-250ml in volume.

The book Putting Food By recommends canning pints or half pints (about the range you have) of hot-pack pimentos at 10lbs pressure (240F/116C) for 20 minutes (sorry for the American measurements, it's an American book).  They also recommend putting a small amount of acid in the canning liquid, like 1tsp white vinegar per pint.

By "hot-pack" they mean grilled, skinned, and put in the jar while still warm, with warm liquid.

Added in response to comments:

Per the asker's comment, healthy canning recommends 35 minutes at 10-11lbs pressure.

So I decided to look in the USDA guide, and see what the tie breaker is, and their recommendation is 35 minutes as well.

So I'm not entirely certain whether the Putting Food By recommendation is dated (this is the 1982 edition), or whether the 20min time reflects the addition of a small amount of acid to the canning liquid.


What wine(s) would you substitute for sweet red vermouth? I want to make a chukar cherry sauce recipe which calls for 1/2 cup of sweet red vermouth, which gets cooked and reduced with the cherries and other ingredients.  I don't have vermouth on hand, and I'm reluctant to buy a bottle I may never use again given the number of other wines I have around.

So, my question is: what wine or combination of wines and other ingredients would be the best substitute for the flavor of sweet red vermouth in cooking, from the list below?

Marsala wine
Sherry
White table wine (many varieties)
Red table wine (many varieties)
Sake
Sweet white dessert wine
Red and white wine vinegar
Brandy
Other pantry staples (sugar, lemons, etc.)

(I'm OK with the color being different, I really just care about the flavor)

I'd say sherry or marsala will have the closest flavor profile in terms of sweetness, with obviously some nuance of the herbal qualities of vermouth lost. But you could add some spices and herbs to make up for that (cloves, cinnamon, dried ginger, star anise, maybe bitter herbs like mugwort, which is easy to find where I am, or something like thyme or sage). See this article for a rough rundown of what might be in a typical vermouth.

That being said, fruit compotes are amenable to quite a lot of variations in alcohol. I sometimes used a white wine when making rote Grütze, a German style berry sauce/compote, but it's common to add a splash of something like cassis liqueur and fruit juice, but the one that went over the best I made with tart verjus. Brandy could work in moderation. If I went that direction, I'd use a fruit juice in roughly 90% the volume of vermouth intended and 10% in brandy.


Rub Roast Before or After Searing? I just put the roast beef in the oven and I don't know if I ruined it already.
So, what happened:

I lavishly applied a rub of salt, black pepper, dried rosemary, and fresh garlic to the meat prior to searing. Then I tried to sear it in the pan. The crust of herbs got darker and darker but the meat underneath was still quite raw, until finally the kitchen filled with thick smoke as the herbs started to blacken and got charred. And I feel kind of dumb that I didn't see that in advance.
I tried to make the best out of the situation, scraped the burnt herbs off, applied fresh herbs and put it in the oven at 90°C as planned.

Now the catch: The order of operations was dictated to me beforehand.
I painstakingly followed the rules set forth by my girlfriend - the rules for roast beef haven been handed down from one generation to the next in her family from ancient times, apparently Pharaoh Sethos I invented these rules and who am I to question them?
And the rules say: rub before searing.

Now I want to put the following question to the community:
Rub roast before or after searing? What would you do if you were not bound by any questionable ancient wisdom and a proto-sumeric curse?

I think there is a place for both. Without being aware of the particulars of this received wisdom/commandments from on high, it is a little hard to say. Seasoning of meat is often performed before searing (think steaks), but this is commonly only in the form of a thin layer of salt and pepper and maybe herbs too, not a thick complete covering. I have also seared roasts and then placed on a bed of herbs and garlic to roast - though not rubbed as such.

If you used seasoning as above and not a thick layer, then it would be reasonable to sear after rubbing. However, if you applied a thick layer so as to form a crust, these will have to heat up to searing temp before the meat could even approach a temperature at which the maillard reaction could occur. This would also be at or above the temperature at which the sugars in the herbs would also caramelize and start to burn, as happened in your case. In such a case I would not sear, unless in a very hot oven for maybe 5-10 min, before turning down to cooking temp.

It could also be that the family recipe only applies the rub to a portion of the meat, perhaps just the top/skin side, and only sears the bottom (or vice-versa I suppose).

Perhaps your girlfriend's family only use a thin layer of seasoning rub before searing.  It may be best to get an invite to her next family roast and ask to help in the kitchen while preparations are on-going. If you are looking long-term, incidentally this, and helping with the dishes, are a  way to get into the good books with her family too. Another option is to simply ask her how she does it!


What are the downsides to "low and slow" when cooking meat? In many cooking resources, "low and slow" is given as a solution to cooking juicy, tender meat (after it has been seared). Cooking slowly is also highly recommended when making stews and various other sauces.

My question is - what are the downsides? Is going too "low and slow" will make your meat soggy? Can you ever be "too slow"?

The big downside, of course, is time. You don't always want to spend all day cooking something.

For relatively thin pieces of meat (a steak, a chicken breast, a fish fillet) there's just no need to take a long time making it. Worse, you risk making it so tender that it just falls apart. Pulled pork is a wonderful thing, but some days you want slices.

Other cooking methods can add more flavor. In addition to the Maillard reaction, flavorful fats in sautee can bring flavors of their own. Cooking on a grill introduces smoky flavors.

Low and slow maximizes tenderness, but there are other desirable textures. Frying brings crunchiness, which you can't get from low-and-slow. Baked fish takes on a firm texture. And so on.

Low and slow is a crucial tool to have in your arsenal, but it's not the only technique you should learn. Some days you just want to slap something in a pan.


pressure cooker overflowing while cooking soup All my life I've cooked soup in a big, old (over 30 years old) pressure cooker. I'd boil all the vegetables in it, open it to blend them all together, then add cabbage and let it boil anew.

Now, in an attempt to boil the vegetables for less time and, therefore, avoid losing so many nutrients, I've started blending the raw vegetables. That way, the whole thing only needs to boil once and the flavours are much stronger. What I do is simply blend the vegetables with some water until it is a thick 'juice'. Then I add some more water, to make it less thick, add the cabbage and put it on the cooker.

Unfortunately, the blended 'juice' starts foaming (I'm not quite sure if that's the accurate word, since I'm not a native speaker, but to me it looks like a thick vegetable foam) and often spills over the little opening for releasing some of the pressure. I've tried boiling it in a normal pot, and the situation was the same: whenever the soup comes to a boil, the foam starts climbing up the pot and, if the fire isn't immediately turned down, it will overflow.

Can someone explain why this happens now when it didn't before? And how can I avoid it overflowing?

Simply put: it's happening because you're now blending the vegetables prior to cooking.

All vegetables are composed of plant cells, which have relatively rigid, fibrous walls composed of various starches; these trap the moisture and nutrients that the plant needs to survive, and provide structure. As you cook (applying heat) those starches will soften and become less rigid. Some of the cells will burst and allow their interiors to leach out, but on the whole the structure slowly deforms and collapses as you cook. Once softened, the structure can be easily pulverized/blended.

If you blend your vegetables prior to cooking, the starches are too tough to completely destroy; they get shredded into small fibers instead. If you then apply heat, the fibers (and various proteins contained in the plant) will still link up with one another, and are still tough enough to provide some structure while also being extremely light. As a result, they'll form bubbles that trap steam as it boils out of the solution, producing the foam that you're seeing.

You could try adding an enzyme like pectinase to break down pectin, one of the compounds responsible for the foam. This will only be partially effective because there are other starches which contribute to the foaming effect, and pectinase works on pectin only.

You could also try reducing the heat and letting your blended vegetables only come to a bare simmer; that will reduce the steam being forced out of solution, and thus reduce the number of bubbles that form. This wouldn't really be an option in the pressure cooker, which relies on higher heat to produce pressure and thus faster cooking.

But really, the easiest way to avoid this would simply be going back to your old method of boiling before blending. The foam is tricky enough to deal with that you won't gain much in terms of convenience by just boiling once. And if you want to preserve the nutrients from the raw vegetables, blending first may do more harm than good because you're exposing them to additional oxygen and heat which break them down. There's not really a lot you can do to protect those nutrients from the high heat of a pressure cooker at any rate. If you want to preserve them as much as possible, you'll want to try a juicer or some other process that doesn't involve the application of (much) heat.


Baking bread with a firm texture that doesn't grow mold I bake large quantities of bread like 50kg a day. People are complaining that the butter bread, when I slice it, is like a sponge in texture and gets moldy in three days. How can I get a firmer texture and delay mold growth? The ingredients I use are margarine, flour, milk, nutmeg, yeast, vanilla extract, sugar and salt. I don't add eggs.

Mold grows on bread because mold spores in the air, or on hands or other surfaces, get transferred to the bread. Bread has plenty of nutrients for these spores to grow.  Mold growth is enhanced by temperatures over 70 degrees F (21C). Humidity and moisture also favor mold growth.
There are a couple of things you can recommend or do to reduce mold growth.
Bread should be handled with clean hands.
Bread should be kept well wrapped.
Refrigeration dramatically slows mold growth.
Freezing virtually stops mold growth.
If not freezing, consume bread as soon as possible.
Margarine and milk help keep the texture soft, and reduce staling.  If you want a firmer texture, you might consider a formula without these ingredients.


What is the shelf life for candy with fresh butter? I am making a chocolate covered candy with a center that includes fresh butter, sugar and cookie crumbs.  There are no eggs in the recipe.  It is not cooked.  What is the shelf life before it needs to be refrigerated?

I agree with Jay. If you live in a hot city (with temperatures above 30°C), I wouldn´t keep it out of the fridge more than a couple hours. Otherwise they should last at least five hours at room temperature.


Is there any reason to scald milk? I recently found an old family cream pie recipe that called for scalding the milk.  Is there any reason to do this other than to kill bacteria? If not, isn't this an unnecessary step if using pasteurized milk?

If you've found a very old recipe that calls for scalding for food safety reasons, then yes, it is probably unnecessary.  However, there are places where it is called for.

In particular, when making Béchamel (which is made by combining milk and roux), it is important to scald or at least warm the milk, otherwise you can and most likely will end up with lumps.  The reason to actually scald as oppose to simply warming the milk tends to be one of cooking time; the hotter the milk is, the less time you have to spend whisking.

In general, any recipe that calls for milk and needs to thicken tends to benefit from scalding for the latter reason - it just takes less time to thicken that way.