How do I save curry with too much cumin? I think I may have added too much cumin in my curry sauce last night and it has this dry seasoning taste in every bite.  It may have soaked into the veggies as well... Is there a way to save the curry that is left? An ingredient or something to balance it out?

If you have a dry seasoning taste it's possible that the spice simply wan't cooked enough. If you added a load of cumin (or other dry spice ) at the very end then it may not have had enough exposure to heat. If this is the case then simply cooking it for 10-15 minutes may improve it somewhat.

One thing that has worked for me before in similar cases is adding some yogurt or a dab of cream and cooking it for a bit. I think it may be that the fats in them help the cumin to release their essential oils, or it could be that the flavors of the milk have some sort of interaction. The reason it has worked is unknown to me.

Beyond that there's nothing you can do that I know of. A bit of cooking work yogurt is probably worth your time and effort to save it, but any more than that is likely a waste of your time and money.


Grilling burgers: flip once, or keep flipping? When grilling burgers I usually flip several times, but have recently been advised to cook forever on once side, flip once, cook and be done.

Is that the best way to do it?

How do you know when a burger is ready to flip?

I'm solidly in the flip as often as you want camp.  As long as it's not over (or under) cooked I find that you get better results flipping often. Plus you can rearrange things to make more room as you flip.

To tell how cooked a burger is poke it with a finger or something else that's not too sharp; just like a steak the more cooked it is the more firm it will be.  You just need to learn how "squishy" you like them.

Also, as fun as it is, don't press the whole burger into the grill!  All that happens is that the delicious juices are forced out.


Refreezing bottled juice I have a bottle of grape juice. I want to freeze the juice to extend the life of the juice. After thawing, can the juice be refrozen without ruining the juice?

Me think the juice will lose some of its taste.

Instead of freezing the whole bottle, try freezing smaller portions so you only thaw portions as you need them.

You could use "Ziplock" type freezer bags, or small plastic or glass containers  to portion the juice in smaller quantity.


Can a frozen turkey be "fresh"? In the US, turkeys labelled "fresh" can't be held (by the retailer) below 26F. The idea, as I've understood it, is that fresh turkeys aren't supposed to be frozen.

Well, one that I bought last year was definitely frozen in the middle. And yesterday, I was shopping for a thanksgiving turkey and all of the ones labelled "fresh" were suspiciously firm to the touch.

My question is, Will a turkey held at 26F freeze? Or at least become what a person might think of as frozen?

Good Eats actually had something on this many years ago, as effectively turkeys aren't just water, so it doesn't freeze at the same point at water.

Copying/reformatting from the Good Eats Fan Page transcript of Romancing the Bird:

  Chuck: Just look at this. The USDA recognizes three distinctive market varieties of turkeys. The first is frozen.

  Alton: Meaning below 32 degrees?

  Chuck: Only turkeys cooled to zero degrees or lower can be labeled frozen.

  Alton: Well, uh, set me straight here, Chuck, but I thought 32 was the freezing point.

  Chuck: For water, sure. But the moisture in meat isn't just water. It's full of all manner of dissolved solids that effectively reduce its freezing point.

  Alton: You don't say. Okay. Thanks.

  Chuck: Oh, next at 1 to 26 degrees—although most manufacturers shoot for 24 to 26—are refrigerated birds.

  Alton: But frozen are so great, why bother?

  Chuck: Because refrigerated birds aren't as rock hard as frozen so they don't require as much thawing time. And grocers don't need as much freezer space.

  Alton: Is that it?

  Chuck: Oh, no, no, no. Fresh turkeys are a whole other thing. Fresh turkeys can never go below 26 degrees.

  Alton: But that's still below freezing.

  Chuck: Not in turkey.


What are the black spots on the lid of my expensive oil bottle? I ordered a couple of oils from Amazon and those were shipped to me from India last week. I was using one today and found some black spots on the inner side of the cap. I tried wiping it away but doesn't seem to budge. I tried scraping with a toothpick but still no luck. I have seen the same kind of spots on another oil bottle cap, but discarded it thinking it might be mold. Has anyone had anything similar?

Notice that this is in a silvery patch that differs in color from the rest of the cap, and that there are similar small silver spots on the interior ridges of the cap screw closure (visible in your first picture). To me it looks like the cap was inexpertly coated with some kind of gold-colored treatment, probably to prevent corrosion, but part of the treatment was missed or rubbed away. The black spots are most likely corrosion of the underlying, exposed metal, possibly caused by contact with tiny amounts of moisture on the spout of the bottle at some point when it was sealed. It doesn't appear to show up anywhere on the gold-colored treatment, and the spots appear to be quite small.

If there is no evidence of mold within the oil (such as clouding of the oil or exposed glass, other black spots on the lip of the oil container, etc.) then most likely this is metal corrosion that is unlikely to cause a problem unless you're planning to store this oil for months or years. I probably wouldn't reuse this cap if you're recycling the oil container for another purpose - it looks to be cheaply made, and already showing it.


What is the name of this Turkish chocolate? They are from Turkey but have no idea what they are traditionally called. Although the box is generic, the contents are from a Turkish confectionery.

The brown and white ones are almonds covered in chocolate and the green and white ones are pistachios covered in white chocolate. While the dark, milk and white chocolate balls have bits of coffee bean in them.

Alibaba has a site that let's you search by region, and indeed there is a page for Turkish chocolate including chocolate covered almonds.

As far as I can tell brand names seem to be Tafe and the ChocoVia and Dojo produced by Besler. Those brand names do not exclusively refer to chocolate covered almonds - which are called "chocolate covered almonds" on the Alibaba website, so that's no real help. But then I searched the company websites, and Tafe has a listing of "Çikolata Kaplı Drajeler". As per Google translate "Çikolata Kaplı" means "chocolate covered" ("Drajeler" is translated as "drapes", I don't think this can be correct), so there is a good chance that these are actually called "chocolate covered almonds" in Turkey.

As rumtscho in the comment pointed out Drajeler is a loan word from the French. "Draje" means (according to the first dictionary I could find) both:

sugar-coated pill.
chocolate-coated raisin or nut.


Bacon/pork fat to replace shortening in rolls? I don't have shortening and was wondering what pork fat would do to the texture of my crusty rolls?  Can pork or bacon fat be used to replace shortening in rolls?

Absolutely, it make give it a  smokey but pleasant after taste but I in some ways prefer it to commercial lard. All bacon fat is, is a type of lard anyways done with typical dry heat such as a skillet or pan. It is arguably the best replacement you can use when making such dishes.


How easily can table salt be contaminated? In Alton Brown and The Food Lab Play With Chicken, Alton Brown (jokingly?) chides J. Kenji Lopez-Alt for touching raw chicken right before pinching salt from a tub.

AB: So it's okay to put your hands on the chicken and then stick em back in the salt. Okay, also noted. Good sanitation procedures.
JKLA: What's going to live in the salt?
AB: Nothing's going to live in the salt at all. I'm just giving you crap.

Is it true that nothing is going to live in the salt? Practically, how likely is it for salt to become unsafe for consumption through unsafe sanitation procedures?
As far as I know, there are organisms which can thrive in saline environments, but extreme halophiles are found in solutions of 20 to 25% salinity, not crystalline NaCl. Would mold be a concern? Perhaps the amount of time between contamination and use would make a difference? Does it matter if the salt is granular or in a solid block?

No foodborne illness is going to be able to live in pure salt, in fact even low concentrations of salt will kill most foodborne illness organisms - which is why salt is used as a preservative. However, that does not mean that it's a good idea to touch the salt with contaminated hands because:

You could contaminate the container the salt is in, anyone touching the container could pick up the illness and transfer it to themselves or the food
If there was a significant piece of food stuck to your hands when you touch the salt the piece could fall off into the salt, and any part of it which does not come in direct contact with the salt could remain contaminated. If you came into contact with that piece you could pick up the contamination
From a non-safety perspective, getting chicken juice in your salt is going to make it stick together and get nasty because of the moisture

When I prepare a chicken for baking I do the same thing - I pour salt and spices in a bowl and then pinch it out of that bowl before rubbing it on the skin. When I'm done I throw out any remaining mix and wash the bowl. When filming a show like the food lab they do the same thing - everything is going to get cleaned afterwards, so if the bowl got contaminated it doesn't really matter and the salt is not going to be re-used.

The takeaway from this is that it was fine in the food lab, but it would not be fine at home if your were using your main salt container.


Can you leave chicken in smoker after it quits cooking to stay warm Can you leave chicken in the smoker after it has stopped cooking to keep it warm?

Safety-wise, as long as you keep the chicken above 140°F, you can keep it there forever. Once you get below 140°F, you're supposed to have it either eaten or cooled to 40°F within 2 hours. (It's actually safe a little lower—but it's best to leave a margin of error!) For details, see How do I know if food left at room temperature is still safe to eat?

Quality-wise, it's going to continue to cook, and its going to continue to lose moisture (unless your smoker is really humid, like a commercial combi oven can be). The hotter it is, the faster it will cook and dry out. Cooking is fairly slow once you get down to near 140°F, though.

Three hours should be doable.


Is there a device that can be used to grate coconut and sweet potatoes electrically? Does anyone know of a tabletop device that can grate coconut electrically? I love coconut products but most recipes call for grating the kernel which I do not like to do, it is a hard job, sometimes bits of my skin end end up in the grate. Long ago my brother made what he called a coconut mill by wrapping and fastening a nail punched tin plate around a cylindrical wooden block and then attaching a shaft through the block with a hand crank at one end he then attached the shaft through bearings fastened over a box for catching the finished product which was milled by pressing the coconut kernel between a narrow gap made by a rigid piece of material and the milling block and turning the hand crank.

I know many will say just use a blender but a good amount of people warn me not to blend coconuts for making the products of interest, they also warn me not to blend sweet potatoes for the famous sweet potato pudding the Caribbean people love so much, so the above device could be used for grating sweet potatoes for puddings as well,

I have searched a lot but can not find any electrical device that will give the same result as grating, is there something that can do this that I am not aware of?

If nothing exist I may have to use my brother's idea with an electrical motor and control to invent something.

Check this out:

Presto 02910 SaladShooter Electric Slicer/Shredder

I haven't used it personally, but two of the top 3 reviews mention using it for grating both potatoes and coconuts.  There's also a "professional" version that's probably a bit more versatile/reliable.

Considering how silly the idea sounds, it seems to have gotten some pretty rave reviews and is also inexpensive.  So give it a try maybe?


Pros and cons to cooling gelato liquid? So, I'm new to the world of desserts and am getting into making some gelato. My ice cream maker is the type that has a cooler in it so it pre-cools the bucket and continues cooling it while churning.

Given that, I've seen some recipes that specifically call for heating the gelato base and then cooling it overnight before churning.

What are the pros/cons of such a tactic? My assumption is that, since my ice cream maker can cool the bucket, starting with a hot liquid will have little, if any, difference than starting with a chilled liquid. Am I incorrect?

I would chill overnight for several reasons.
1) the faster it freezes the smoother the smaller the ice crystals, the smoother the ice cream.
2) allowing to sit overnight seems to have a good effect on the flavor.
3) If your machine isn't made for handling hot liquids, it may damage it.


Melted pot residue on solid plate cooker My enamel pasta pot, which I've had for years, melted into my solid plate stove after I forgot the plate on.  It smelled like burning plastic.  I removed the pot and it was so hot that it charred my wooden chopping board.  The stove plate was glowing red and after removing the pot there was a residue burnt into the solid plate of my cooker.  I tried scraping it off but it had hardened and feels like plastic and looks like solid aluminium.  How can I remove the melted parts from the solid plate?

This might not have a happy ending I am afraid. You might need to get a replacement part for the plate.

If it was a true enamel pot (and it sounded like one) rather than an aluminium pot with an anodized surface, that is a metal pot with an enamel coating, once it is heated to above the fusing temperature of the enamel (500C at least, likely much higher), the coating will melt. What you went through is the reverse of the process to apply the enamel.

Enamels are metal based compounds, ceramic or glass like once re-solidified. It tends to fuse with metal and glass with no defined boundary. Despite that it is typically brittle, it is going to be very difficult to get it off the stove, especially if it is a metal hot plate or a ceramic hob. Enamel is pretty unreactive. Anything that would dissolve it would likely first dissolve your cooker surface. It is also much harder than the cooker materials. Heating it back up to fusing temperature would only help enhance bonding of the enamel to the cooker.

Not a terribly helpful answer I am sorry to say. Hopefully, I am wrong and there is a more helpful suggestion from others.


Chocolate Cream Pie using coconut cream or Coconut milk? Can I substitute coconut milk or coconut cream for milk in a chocolate cream pie?

Yes. I made a coconut cream pie this weekend using coconut milk.

Cream pies are set mostly by starch with help from the eggs.

The protein in the milk does not play a significant role in the pie structure. The fat from the milk is important to the texture. Pies made with whole milk are much more delightful than those made with skim.

Coconut milk, and especially coconut cream, has plenty of delightful fat and works well. You may find that the color is different and more translucent. Many recipes call for a mixture of coconut milk and regular milk.


Food was left in Instant Pot for a month and it grew mold. Is it safe to use it after cleaning? I have an Instant Pot. I made some rice about a month ago and haven’t used it since. Unfortunately someone in the house put the cover on the pot with the rice inside and left it there.  I just opened it and it was covered in a very think layer of green mold.

Can I use the Instant Pot again if I clean it with hot water and soap?

Honestly? I would scrub the pot, and then toss it in the dishwasher and be done with it. So long as the smooth surface (notice I did not say scratched up) is clean meaning no visible soil, then running it through the dishwasher with its hot water, detergent and possibly drying cycle will be more than enough. It's not like you have some biochemical experiment you need to avoid doping. Just practice good hygeine with your cooking equipment and you'll be fine.


When should food colouring be added to part of a batch of bread dough? I recently made coloured swirled bread, in which different colours of dough (in my case a coloured and an uncoloured piece) were rolled together and baked in the same loaf to give an interesting novelty appearance. When I put it into the oven the poke test on the uncoloured dough rose up slowly, but the uncoloured sprang back a bit more quickly. The finished bread rose acceptably, but not spectacularly, and the coloured dough was somewhat denser than the uncoloured.  The whole thing was a sourdough loaf if that makes any difference.

When should the colouring for the coloured piece have been added?

after kneading?  This is what I did.  With liquid colouring, which seemed to colour individual strands of gluten, this required considerable kneading to distribute evenly.  This amounted to nearly twice the amount of kneading as the uncoloured piece.  Since the undivided full batch of dough had completed kneading (it was at windowpane) when I divided them, I might possibly have overkneaded the coloured piece.  The uncoloured piece would also have undergone more fermentation than the coloured piece due to how long the extra kneading took (even in the fridge).
before kneading?* This would have allowed the colouring to be more easily mixed in, but would also have required each colour of dough to be separately kneaded to windowpane strength as well as separately proofed.  Not only would I need to be sure each piece was equivalently kneaded but also equivalently proofed.  As with the other option this would leave one piece fermenting longer than the other.

EDIT: *before kneading referring to the point when the flour and water and other ingredients have been barely incorporated together and the result is still just a "shaggy mess" as some describe it.  I assume that "kneading" is a specific stage of breadmaking for the purpose of gluten development, not merely an act of kneading at any point in the process.

I baked 3 or 4 loaves of challah last January over a month period to try and perfect a rainbow loaf of bread for a dinner party (Wizard of Oz and over the rainbow themed).

Loaf 1 I mixed ingrediants and worked the dough and then prior to kneading I used cake decorating gelled (Wilton brand) coloring.  This required substantial kneading to fully integrate the coloring and probably caused the loaf to not rise properly from over work or inconsistent gluten formation.

Subsequent loaves required making the water and yeast mixture and dripping in 5-35 drops of liquid food coloring into measured amounts of liquid by weight. Each liquid amount depending on rainbow location varied and the apparent strength of the drops did too. The liquid mixture then had a consistent bright color and adding in the sugar, salt and flour proved to make for a consistent color shading throughout.  The minimal quantity of the alcohol/glycol based coloring didn't appear to affect the texture and the need to over work the dough was lessened since the color was consistent from the beginning.

Using up to 7 different colors in 1 large loaf (both rainbow shaped in a large baked bowl and in a braided roll) did require a bit more effort than making 1 batch of dough and separating briefly after kneading to add color. However the effort was well worth it!


Why did flatbread dominate the Middle East but Europe adopted raised breads? This may be a history question so please move it if appropriate.

Culturally, local ingredients dominate cooking recipes and national dishes (e.g., soy in SE Asia), but why do Europeans add a raising agent to bread items to make loaf bread whilst people from the Middle East still favour flat breads?

Were raising agents discovered in Europe and never migrated?  Is there a taste difference?

I'm going to agree with Szczerzo about this being an anthropologic question, but I'm going to disagree about the cause.  While nomadic lifestyles was an influence, it's not causative.

I'm also going to ignore the distinction made about raising agents in the OP, because it's factually incorrect; most Arab/Levantine/Turkish/Kurdish breads use yeast.  Instead, I'm going to answer the distinction between loaf bread and flatbread.

Specifically: loaf bread is an aberration, not flatbread.  You find flatbreads around the world in every society that has access to any kind of grain anywhere.  Europe, Asia, Africa, Americas, Malaysia, everywhere.  Some are raised (yeasted) and some are not.  Some are filled and some are not.  All grains are used: wheat, barley, millet, rice, lentils, corn, etc.

Whereas: loaf bread pretty much only shows up in Egypt (and nearby) and in Europe, and there's good reason to believe that the latter two regions learned it from Egypt.  Thing is, loaf bread requires several different things to be easily and cheaply available in the same place:

Wheat or barley (high-gluten flours)
Ability to build brick, stone, or earthen ovens (this is where nomadism isn't compatible)
Ability to cultivate starters (both the right grains and the right weather)
Inexpensive, but hot, fuel for ovens (e.g. wood)

This combination simply didn't happen in too many places; either people lacked suitable grains, lacked cheap fuel, didn't build ovens, or simply never got started (the Babylonians appear to only have made flatbread, for example, despite having all the right ingredients and tools).

So it's really not so much a question of "why did X culture only make flatbread" as "why did these three places make loaf bread?"

If you're interested in this, I highly recommend the book Six Thousand Years Of Bread.


How to properly use a butter stick's wrapper? Rectangular sticks of butter usually come wrapped in a wax paper-esque wrapper that is folded over the stick.

How am I supposed to use the wrapper so that I can easily unwrap the stick, cut off a portion that I want to use, and then re-wrap the stick for preservation?

I inevitably end up tearing the wrapper, which makes poor seals for rewrapping and storage.

I would suggest one of:

1) Cut the butter with a sharp knife (if cold enough) and throw away paper on portion you use. Then take a small square of aluminum foil to cover the end (or cellophane).

2) Do the above but don't worry about the foil. Butter will keep fine in the fridge uncovered.

3) If you're not keeping your butter in the fridge then I'd suggest just getting a porcelain butter keeper for it and use what you need. I've tried the ones that you put into water and I ended up with a disgusting mold factory.

4) Use a butter keeper in the fridge. I clean mine with hot water and then dry with a towel and put a new stick of butter on it while it's still warm. The bottom of the butter melts slightly and then sticks to the porcelain so it's easier to cut off a piece when cold.

5) I've seen Gordon Ramsay use the aluminum butter wrapper to wrap a piece of veal that he then puts into the oven. Who knew?


Only recipe I can find for Anacini says "as much as plain flour as the mixture will need" http://tuscanity.com/?p=96

What does that mean - they say "until the mixture becomes an easy workable smooth dough" - but how do you know if you haven't added enough or added too much?

Do you have a better recipe?

Biscuits require 3:2:1 flour:liquid:fat. Cookies are 1:2:3 sugar:fat:flour. (from Michael Ruhlman's book Ratio)

I'm guessing based on the description you'll fall somewhere in the crack between there around 5 cups flour.  However, you will simply need to develop the dough maker's intuition by trial and error. I'm guessing a strict cookie dough ratio will be too inelastic,  but I've never had these "cookies"before, nor have I made any with wine in them. All the same I think that you'll be toward the cookie end of that ratio spectrum (biscuit v. cookie). Just be patient adding tablespoon by tablespoon.


Does dead yeast result in a stickier dough? I'm trying to troubleshoot my pizza dough. I've made it twice and both times it was too sticky to knead.

The first time I figured that I killed the yeast (the package said don't go above 140°F and I took the water off the stove when the thermometer read 140°F), so the second time I used water that was 128°F, reading the thermometer right before adding the yeast and sugar. The yeast bubbled a bit but I'm not sure if it was as frothy as it's supposed to be.

The recipe I'm using is to mix 1 package of yeast with 1¾ cups of warm water and ½ tsp sugar, then add to 4 cups pastry flour and ½ tsp salt.

I've made bread before and this dough is nothing like what I'm used to. Flouring the counter top and wetting my hands does nothing to prevent the dough from sludging. I also tried mixing it with a wooden spoon for a few minutes, hoping it would thicken. Would dead yeast cause the stickiness, or am I just preparing it wrong?

No, the dead yeast (if it was dead at all) has nothing to do with the stickiness.

Your dough has 87.5% hydration, which is unusually high. It also uses, for some unclear reason, pastry flour, so it will behave like much higher hydration.

The stickiness is absolutely to be expected with this recipe. If you have never done high hydration doughs, maybe you want to start in a more gradual way, maybe something like 80% with bread or at least AP flour, and and when you are OK with this go on to work with wetter recipes. Also see What can I do to keep high hydration dough from sticking to my hands? for how to become a bit more comfortable working with sticky dough.

If you don't know how to arrive at the number:
1.75 cups of water is 420 g
4 cups of flour is 480 g
420 is 87.5% of 480, so your hydration is 87.5%

You can repeat the calculation for other bread recipes.


How should I decorate a Spanish Epiphany cake? I live in Spain, however, being a Brit, Jan 6th really isn't high on my list of holidays - but what the heck!

Tonight I have a few Spanish friends coming over, so I have made a bit of a buffet, laid down quite a bit of alcohol and want to make the cake that they all seem to think is obligatory for Epiphany - help!

I have a whole raft of ideas in front of me, the basic cake is not the issue, it's the decoration and any significance to the decoration - I really don't want to offend anyone...

If you do a google image search for roscón de reyes (Spanish spelling) you'll find them usually decorated with candied fruit, either just red (glacé cherries), red and green or red, green and orange. Sources vary, whether the fruit are supposed to stand for the jewels, the Three Wise Men brought to Bethlehem or for the jewels on a crown per se. Coarse sugar and chopped / slivered almonds are also rather frequent. Overall, there seem lots of different layouts and decorations, so I think, if you somewhat stick to "(alternating types of) candied fruit arranged on top", you're good to go.

If you do have a bit of a perfectionistic attitude, remember that the traditional decoration may vary from region to region, even from family to family. While I personally believe that your friends are probably already deeply moved by your gesture (otherwise I'd have them bring the cake), if you want some inspiration, I suggest you take a walk and check the window displays of your local bakeries - they'll have what's considered "the right" version in your place.


Hot tea with lemon juice and fat free milk: how to prevent curdling? So I know it may sound a bit weird, but I like milky tea with some lemon juice added. I pop a teabag into the mug, fill it about 2/3 with boiling water, let seep a bit, remove teabag, add some freshly-squeezed lemon, then slowly add cold fat-free milk (and add stevia for sweetness). How can I make myself a cuppa without the milk curdling?

I don't think this is practically possible with lemon juice, as milk protein will curdle in the presence of acid (in this case, citric acid in the lemon juice)—and the process happens much more quickly at hotter temperatures, as in tea.

A pinch of salt may slow the process, but is likely to be unpalatable.

You could neutralize the acid with baking powder, but getting the right balance would be difficult, and again, the result is likely to be disconcerting and unpalatable.

If it is not the acidic balance that you appreciate in your tea, but rather the flavor of the lemon, you might try making a simple syrup with lemon zest, and using that to sweeten your tea.  It will give the lemon flavor, without the acidity, and so not trigger the curdling.


Sourdough Starter Black Spots Hi All! I tried to make a sourdough starter, and after 24 hours I uncovered it and discovered black spots and 2 white fluffy areas. The black spots are only at the top layer so can I still use it after removing this layer?

I would discard this batch, carefully clean everything and start over.

If you truly mixed well in the beginning, then the fluffy bits are probably mold and the black spots are somewhat fishy as well. After only 24 hours, you won’t have a strong culture going under that top layer and the mold problem will likely continue. Remember that a sourdough means that the desired yeasts and bacteria grew faster than the unwanted ones and that they create an environment where they can outcompete possible intruders. While a mature starter with problems can be salvaged by using just a bit from an unaffected area, this is not true for fresh flour and water mixes.

If you start over now, you won’t have lost much: a day and a cup of flour perhaps?

Not part of your question but perhaps helpful:
The amount of yeasts is greatest on wholegrain flour - it may be worth it to get a small bag from your local organic store. For upkeep / later feeding, white flour is fine.


Are there any savoury dishes using matcha tea? I know that you can use matcha powder in a similar way to chocolate in sweet foods but are there any savoury dishes you can make with it?

One trend I've seen recently is making tea broths/sauces for meats, fishes, etc...  Besides being a good use for tea, this has the double effect of giving off the tea's natural aroma when presented to the eater as opposed to simply using the tea to crust a meat - where you wouldn't really get any tea flavor until you actually bit in.

I've also seen people smoking meats with tea leaves and such.  I haven't tried this myself to see if the results are worth the trouble (aka - if you can actually taste the tea flavor).

I would also try poaching various items in a matcha tea poaching liquid.  For example:

Water
Sugar + salt
Matcha tea powder
Peppercorns
Bay leaves
Whatever else sounds good to you.

You could use this to poach chicken and fish.

Lastly, don't be afraid to add it to soups!  Carrot-ginger soup would benefit from the addition of some matcha powder.


Is this video showing an exception of the common wisdom that you shouldn't cook with EVOO? I know this question has been discussed here before, such as this question. But I am asking it again to share the video in this blog post.

The video shows how you use the extra virgin olive to cook, even to fry potatoes, the oil does not even come close to its burning point. Do you think this settles the question in the favor of cooking with extra virgin olive oil?

You can cook with olive oil, but there's not many reasons to actually do it (see the comments). What is more important than what oil you use, is that the oil is fresh. Some fresh oils you can heat to 450–475 F/230–250 C, but when it starts getting rancid (and oil does very quickly), you will reach the smoke point at around 350 F/175 C.

Harold McGee explains (Youtube).

Oil heated to its smoke point.

What you should consider is price. Olive oil has a subtle flavour and it will mellow out when you're cooking with it and all oils will eventually taste the same after heating.

Bonus tip: I don't remember if it's in the linked video clip McGee talks about this, but to keep oils fresh longer, he suggest wrapping them in tin foil to reflect the light. (And of course keeping them cool, but not in the fridge.)


What is the best and fastest way to liquify Nutella chocolate spread? I usually put some amount in a cup and add a very small amount of water to start mixing. This is usually effective as long as the amount of water is very small compared to chocolate, in which the chocolate still has a strong taste.
I thought of using milk, but I do not want the chocolate's taste to be faded (milk has a taste compared to water being neutral ).I also tried using the microwave, but that was pretty useless.

I want something really fast and reliable.

Heating it up in the microwave will temporarily make it runnier, but then it will go back to its original consistency. Here are some ways that may work for you:

Add some neutral flavored oil: just a bit though or it will get greasy
Add chocolate syrup: chocolate syrup is very runny will thin it out while still keeping the chocolate flavor. Hershey's is available in the US and UK, Tate and Lyle makes one in the UK. Not sure where you are but there will likely be something available
If you can't find chocolate syrup try making a very thick chocolate milk with some cocoa powder or chocolate milk powder


Non-alcoholic substitute for brandy? I have a cake that calls for 4 Tablespoons of brandy. I don't have any brandy in the house, nor any kind of liquor at all (besides maybe red wine vinegar which doesn't help much). Is there anything I can substitute, or should I just skip? (I think I've skipped the brandy sometimes before when making this recipe and it came out fine.)

It depends what the recipe is, but I've successfully replaced brandy with orange juice or apple juice in the past. It's not a direct replacement for the flavour, of course, but gives a similar strength of flavour, if you see what I mean.


What is the best way to build a kitchen knife collection? I am in the process of upgrading my kitchen hardware. First thing's first: I need a better set of knives than what I currently have.

Rather than breaking the bank by buying a whole set without knowing what any individual knife does, I would like to build it one knife at a time.

Would anyone be able to recommend the first type of knife I should get? I will also appreciate any brand recommendations!

Buy a decent quality steel and sharpen the knives you have.
Replace the ones that your are least comfortable / use the most first.

Essentials:
Chefs knife 8-10" blade pointy tip helps but not essential. (think mines about 8)
Pairing knife 3" pointy tip.
Knife w/ Serated edge. Think tomatoes, bread (big one for bread, little one for tomatoes/veg)

Next:
Filleting knife (ultra flexible, sharp skinning and filleting fish)
Boning knife (less flexible - almost stilleto like knife for dealing with carcass deboning - meat)

On:
Carving both meat and cured fish.


How do you prevent the flour/cornstarch in pork chops from falling off after pan-frying and still be crunchy? I coat my pork chops with cornstarch with seasonings (salt, five-spice, etc.) before pan frying. After pan-frying, the coatings easily fell of from the pork chops. How do you prevent the coating from falling off and at the same time, make it crunchy?

Usually, the pattern for getting coating to stick is dry/wet/dry.

Here's the pattern that I've followed (especially from Cook's Illustrated crunchy pork chop recipies) -

Pat dry the meat with paper towel, then score the meat in a cross-hatched grid pattern, and season well.
Next dredge the chops in plain cornstarch, shake off excess.
Next dip in the liquid (buttermilk flavored with garlic and Dijon
mustard for me, beaten egg would be another option).
Next dredge in seasoned coating (ground corn flakes with more
cornstarch, salt and pepper for me, or cornstarch with whatever
spices/seasonings you want).
Then you let it sit on a wire rack for 10.  This allows the coating to "set."

For the cornflake coating, this holds onto the pork chop incredibly well.  Not sure if that would work as well with cornstarch as the outer coating, but I think the concept would hold.

Here's a place that posted the recipe (Cook's Illustrated keeps most recipes behind a paywall, but this is the same one):

Mens Place: Crispy Pan Fried Pork Chops


Can we digest raw starch? One of the wisdoms passed on early in my family is not to eat certain types of food raw, because they will cause bellyache. It is regarded common sense on par with not to touch a hot stove because it will cause a burn. As far as I can tell, my friends have been educated in the same way.

The foods are usually pointed out individually to the child, but now I think about it, they are all high in starch. A few examples are dough, batter, corn, starch slurry and potatoes. I don't think it is a concern about bacterial contamination - it isn't only said about cookie dough, but also about freshly made bread dough with no eggs in it. It is just that raw starch is considered indigestible.

Now I happened to read the question Is it safe to eat Raw Corn?. Given that the answer there is that it is safe to eat corn, I started wondering if starch is really so bad as to cause bellyache, or is it just a myth everybody believes because they heard of it before they had developed critical thinking. On the other hand, if a significant amount of starch starts its gelation process in the stomach, maybe it will cause unpleasant symptoms through dehydration or similar (although I don't see how it will gellate at body temperature).

So, is there a food safety concern in eating raw starch, or is this a widespread misinformation? And if it doesn't cause ill effects, does it get digested, or just pass through the digestive system unchanged?

We eat raw starch, in small to moderate amounts, almost every day without any obvious side effects.

It's difficult to find good figures, but bananas contain at least 1% starch (if ripe) and, I estimate, as much as 5% assuming only completely yellow bananas are eaten raw.

Fresh garden peas contain around 2% starch given that 40% of the sugars are converted to starch (estimated using the sugar content of snow peas).

Eating raw starch (in moderate amounts) is good for you

As the Wikipedia starch article states,

  Digestive enzymes have problems digesting crystalline structures. Raw
  starch will digest poorly in the duodenum and small intestine, while
  bacterial degradation will take place mainly in the colon.

This is not necessarily a bad thing since undigested starch, or resistant starch as it is known, is a source of insoluble dietary fiber. Upwards of 80% of any raw starch consumed will remain undigested. This overview notes that there is 'also limited evidence for a prebiotic effect of some starches that resist digestion'.

Counter-indications

The same article referred to above states that '[m]ost resistant starches [...] are thought to be fermentable'. And foods fermenting in the gut will produce gas so you might want to avoid eating excessive amounts of raw starch to avoid uncomfortable digestion problems.

This article from a raw food site warns against possible toxicity problems,

  Neither salivary amylase (ptyalin) nor pancreatic amylase can commence
  digestion of the starch until it is released from its globule. These
  starch-containing globules are, therefore, not digested at all and
  must be eliminated from the body as so much debris. Undigested
  materials such as these are toxic in the body and pose an eliminative
  burden without providing energy or other value.

I haven't yet found any scholarly literature to corroborate this, and the fact that this article fails to mention the, well established, role of resistent starch as dietary fiber makes me suspect its accuracy.

TFD's answer above states,

  The energy loss from easting raw starch is huge, there is little
  point. Eat it cooked.

Although I haven't attempted to verify this, I can't see how energy loss counts against eating raw starch if you are getting enough calories from the rest of your diet. It doesn't seem to count against eating celery. The raw food article has another explanation for why we choose not to eat very starchy foods raw,

  Most starches just don't taste that good in their raw state.

  Carrots, sweet potatoes and yams are notable exceptions, however,
  because these tubers, in addition to containing starches, also contain
  enough sugars to give them a sweet flavor.

It seems clear from this article that at least some people enjoy potatoes raw. It also suggests that it is, for the most part, safe to eat them although the resistent starches, as I also indicate, might cause you some gastro-intestinal discomfort.

Another answer here seems to suggest that raw potatoes contain more toxins than cooked. This is incorrect unless the potatoes were cooked at temperatures over 170°C (340°F). The toxins in potatoes are low to begin with unless they are allowed to develop green patches, in which case cooking at normal temperatures won't help.

It is worth noting that, while eating raw starch is probably not going to give you any big problems, you should check that there are no other problems related to eating raw foods that you are not accustomed to.


Can I repair a pan where a spot on the bottom changed after staying too long on the burner? Left my new gift on the burner when I was gonna clean it. Super depressed about it. Can I save it or throw it away?

From the way that picture looks, this is a sandwich-bottom pan with some thin kind of coating on the bottom. That coating seems to have come off. In that case, there is nothing you can do to make it look the way it did before.

If I were you, I would just continue to use the pan as-is. No need to throw it away, as it will still work, and no need to try to change something about the spot, as it is not really repairable.

You'll have to test how reactive the new surface is. If the now-visible layer is aluminium or blue steel, it won't do well in a dishwasher. If you see the spot rusting (or getting some other kind of corrosion), clean away whatever has built up, and from then on, only wash the pan by hand.


What can I cook with noodles and soy sause only Fellows all the ingredients I have in my cabinet are:

1)Noodles (containing egg)
2)1 bottle Soy sause
3)1 botttle Sesame Oil
4)2-3 Onions
4)1 Ginger root

And because I am reallocating I want to cook something without having much leftovers in order to get rid of them. So buying too much extra ingredients is out of question.

So what can I cook with having the ingredients above?

I thought ramen but the last time I tried to make one used too much sesame oil and I did not like it. But I thought I could retry can by just buying pork to make ramen again with the meterials above.

Can you suggest me a recipe having the materials mentioned above; If posssible only them.

Cook and drain the noodles with a stir fry over the top.   Do a sesame oil stir fry with the onions and ginger.  Add in more vegetables and or a protein like chicken or tofu.  I have low sodium diet so I don't do soy sauce but you could finish the stir by down with some soy sauce.


Propane grill leaking from valve stem I can't find this problem anywhere via google.  It's not solved by resetting the regulator (and I'll argue that it shouldn't be below), and doesn't seem to be related to this cooking.se question.

Of my last four propane tanks, I've had this problem with two:  I turn off all (five) burners on my grill and (obviously) leave the tanks valve closed, but as soon as I screw the regulator onto the tank valve, there's a hissing sound of gas and the accompanying smell.  This lasts a few seconds, then stops.  Note that this is before any valves are open.

Then, as soon as I turn on the tank valve (still leaving the burners off), there's more gushing gas sound.  This doesn't seem to stop, even if I let it go for a good few seconds (maybe thirty in total).  I've used soapy water to track the source of this leak, and found it to come from the back of the tank valve — the side opposite the threads, which I gather is the pressure relief valve.

In each case, I've attached a different tank with no trouble, then tried the bad tanks again and had the problem.  So I assume that this is not a problem with my equipment.  Maybe it is, and only turns up with some tanks, but I doubt it.  My main point of evidence is that the gas is actually exiting the propane tank valve itself, not my regulator, hoses, etc.

Last time, I just exchanged the tank and ate the loss of money because I was in a big hurry.  But now I'm wondering, is this a known problem?  Should the store I bought it from agree to just replace my tank for free?  Is there some reason this might actually be a problem with my equipment?

EDIT:
I took the tank back to where I got it, told them the problem, and they just replaced it for free, no hassle.

I'm no expert on flammables, but I've grilled a ton in my day on various equipment, and feel I've learned a couple things that may help here.  However, your mileage may vary, and take this all with a grain of salt.

Is this a known problem?

Depends on what this is.  I agree with your read that this likely isn't your equipment, and is likely something on the tank.  If so, it is not known to me, but I have a different approach on tanks than you.  More below.

Should the store I bought it from agree to just replace my tank for free?

Yes, I think they should do so happily; it leaks gas after all.  If they don't, you should insist (say something about how you were hoping to grill some steaks, not start a house fire).

Is there some reason this might actually be a problem with my equipment?

The only thing I could fathom is if your equipment had some significant downstream pressure, but even if it did, I believe that would cause propane to flow more slowly to your burners, not leak out the back of the tank valve.

Is this a pressure release value?

This doesn't sound like a pressure release valve issue to me.  If it were, the valve would open when the pressure increased inside the tank (usually a function of tank temperature increase), completely unrelated to when you opened the tank valve.

So then what is it?

If I had to guess, I'd say that the bleed screw is not tightened down well.  This screw is opened when they fill the tank (allowing the air to escape while LPG is pumped into the tank).  When they are done filling the tank, the bleed screw should be tightened, and perhaps that wasn't done when these tanks were filled.  With the tank valve closed, check the bleed valve on the back of the tank valve to ensure it is closed.

So what should I do?

For what it is worth, I've never been a fan of those tank exchanges for a handful of reasons:

Partial Fills. Most all of the tank exchanges only put in about 15# (~3.6 gallons) of propane.  Even in warm weather climates you should be able to get 20# (4.7 gallons) of propane into a 20# tank.
Beat-up Tanks. The tanks I see at the exchanges are usually pretty beat-up.  This could be part of what you are seeing, tanks with faulty valves (however, I have to believe they do some level of checking before they ship full tanks back to the retail stores, right?).
Ugly Tanks.  I hate seeing the tank exchange company's brand plastered all over the side of the tank.

I have had excellent luck in buying several new, empty tanks (from Home Depot or the like) and having them filled myself (usually at either a U-Haul, AirGas, or gas station).  It's slightly less convenient, but I get a longer effective tank life (usually 33% more gas in my fill vs. exchanged tanks), better value (the gas is cheaper!), and my tanks don't look nor operate poorly.


Ceramic Cooktop (non induction) getting damaged after use We just moved into a brand new unit(just constructed) and it has a Ceramic cook top. We have only been there 2-3 weeks, and cooked maybe < 10 times.

After a few of our cooking sessions, I am seeing some white coloration around the edge of the cooking circle. It appears to be below the surface, I cant feel anything different around that area. It was below my cookware and I dont think anything splashed on it.

It might be due to the following cases

We used oversized cookware which was actually sitting on the raised edge of the stove and perhaps not actually touching the glass surface.
On a different occasion we used a different situation we used a vessal with a smaller base than the smaller circle, and thus possibly the edges of the circle got overheated or something..

We are very new to ceramic cook tops, mostly experienced with gas, minimal experience with induction. I notice some places suggesting that the cookware base is recommended to be >= size of the circle, is this the cause of our problem?

Is there a way to rectify or is this permanent??

Update: These stains are disappearing/Moving with regular use, I would guess just a new stove phenomenon.

It looks suspiciously like water that's been burned off at the edge of an overboiled pot.

On ceramic tops you get two kinds of stain. You get grease/food burned on, and that'll turn black like the inside of your toaster over, and you get the white mineral stains which comes from water drying around the edges.

The center usually stays clean because it gets super hot and will burn most anything away, but the edges don't get as hot as easily.

The way I clean them and it's considered rather unorthodox is to turn the burner on while the stovetop is bare. Let the edges get hotter than they would if a pan were keeping them cool, and much of this will burn away. After you see no further progress, turn off the stove and let it cool a little, but still above booling point of water, then use the green face of a scotch brite sponge to scrub any residue left over.

You can also try lye, but I am not a big fan of lye cleaners.


How can I estimate cooking time for a brined and roasted turkey? For previous Thanksgivings, we have brined and roasted our turkey.  (Here is the detailed process.)  After brining for about a day, we roast the bird for 30 minutes at 500°F and then bake it at 350°F until it's reached 160°F internally.

The bird is stuffed with an apple and half an onion (sliced), a cinnamon stick and some sage leaves for flavor.  During the high-heat phase, the breast is protected with a foil sheet.  The turkey legs are pulled inward towards the body; we do not spatchcock it.

The problem is that it's always taken much longer than we'd estimated for the turkey to come to temperature.  We end up serving dinner 2 or 3 hours later than expected which is certainly sub-optimal.  Based on the turkey's weight (and preparation process), how can we estimate how long it will take to cook?

We do use an independent thermometer to verify oven temperature.

Ideally, I'd like a formula for how to calculate cooking time from weight, and how to adjust based on details such as brining.

I've never roasted an entire turkey, but my grandmother followed Delia Smith's advice every year and it never failed us. Typically it worked at at around 15 - 20 minutes per lb of bird.

  Cooking times for other sizes of turkey:

  8-10 lb (3.5-4.5 kg) – 30 minutes at the high temperature, then 2½-3
  hours at the lower temperature, then a final 30 minutes (uncovered) at
  gas mark 6, 400°F (200°C).  15-20 lb (6.75-9 kg) – 45 minutes at the
  high temperature, then 4-5 hours at the lower temperature, then a
  final 30 minutes (uncovered) at gas mark 6, 400°F (200°C).


What is the difference between Pasta Sauce and Spaghetti Sauce? I'm deciding to make spaghetti squash today but can't decide what sauce to use: a pasta sauce or spaghetti sauce. I'm sure those are just general terms for many types of sauces, but can anyone give me an idea of the difference between the two? And also, what is marinara sauce?

Marinara sauce is a specific sauce, made with tomatoes, and probably garlic, onions, and herbs.

Spaghetti sauce, in the US, means something tomato-based, possibly with meat. I suppose it's based roughly on marinara or bolognese, depending on what variety you have.

Pasta sauce means absolutely any sauce you can put on pasta. Maybe some people have specific things in mind, certain sauces they use more often, but it's not a specific enough term that you can say "I'm making pasta sauce" and have everyone know even roughly what you mean. In the US, certainly tomato-based ones are extremely common, probably followed by creamy things like alfredo, but there's plenty beyond that.


How to infuse vanilla into bourbon (or other spices into liquor) using low heat without reducing alcohol proof? I want to make and serve a vanilla bourbon, so I want to maintain as much of the alcohol as possible--ideally all of it. I've tried nitrous and room temperature infusions with various amounts of vanilla and over various amounts of time. The flavor isn't as strong as I'd like in the amount of time I'd like. (I'm using just the beans and no sheath because the sheath is lending a tobacco like flavor I don't want.) So I was thinking to try heat to get a stronger flavor faster as I've gotten more pronounced vanilla flavors in shorter time when baking it into desert sauces. I figured that if I add the vanilla beans into the bourbon and heat it on low (below 174 degrees F, the boiling point of alcohol), let that go for x time (I'm thinking less than 10 minutes?), then I should maintain the proof? I tried in a large pot but it boiled at 150F, which I think may have been due to large surface area? I plan on then cooling the mix and letting it infuse for 3-5 days at room temperature (and then compare to the ones I infused at room temperature without any heat). It may be just this simple, but I'm getting a lot of mixed input on the internet.

I was also thinking that if it is reduced significantly, perhaps I could just add the infused mixture into straight bourbon to bring the proof back up.
(Note, I have seen the USDA TABLE OF NUTRIENT RETENTION FACTORS but since this deals with cooking alcohol into food rather than on its own, I figured it may be different.)

(I have also heard of people using sous vide for infusing liquor with heat, but I don't really have those supplies at my disposal). If all else fails, perhaps I will just make a vanilla extract from scratch using bourbon and then use that, but it may be too aggressive.)

Just put a vanilla bean in the bottle of booze and leave it there until the booze is used up. I always have a bottle of rum with a bean it.


How to get uniform bubbles in simple dutch oven bread? I'm using the "Saturday White Bread" recipe from Ken Forkish's Flour Water Salt Yeast. I'm very happy with the results so far, except for the irregularity of the bubbles. Here's my loaf:

For contrast, here's a photo of the same recipe from Forkish's book:

His bubbles are not perfectly uniform, but they are a lot more uniform than mine. The dense areas are not as dense, and the largest bubbles are not nearly as large.
The recipe I followed:

1000 grams all-purpose unbleached flour
720 grams water, 95°f
21 grams salt
4 grams “active dry” yeast
Complete procedure here.

Some areas are very dense with small bubbles, while others are large and cavernous. An average 1/2" thick slice has two or three large holes going clean through.
Is there any way to even out the bubble size without reducing the overall airiness?

Given that the second picture is what you desire, your bread is over proofed. The large irregular bubbles and flat or sunken overall shape is indicative of such. There are a couple of things you can try:

Make sure to form the loaf such that it has a nice taught skin on the outside prior to final proofing. You will notice in the second picture, the bubble structure is obviously interrupted from where the loaf was folded inward onto itself to stretch the outer skin tight. (Note the concentration of large bubbles towards the lower mid-left of the loaf)
Don't let your bread proof for so long. Typically the longer the proofing period, the bigger the bubbles.
Punch the bread down more vigorously between proofings. This helps to pop the bubbles that have gotten too large.

That said, I would much rather eat the first loaf of bread, as that open structure and sturdy crust is what a lot of us home bakers enjoy most.

Extra Credit:
If you want your loaf to be tall instead of flat there are a few other things to try.

Develop a stronger gluten structure by kneading or stretching.
Make sure to form a taught skin around the outside of the dough when shaping the final loaf. This will help to constrict the outward spread of the dough.
Use a structured vessel to support the dough during the final rise. If you try to make a loaf like the one pictured on a flat surface, it will inevitably spread out and droop. Cheers!


Should I keep the meat boiled off of bones when making beef broth? I am making a simple beef stock from the leftover bones from a New York cut roast beef. Beyond adding a mirepoix and boiling the bones for three hours I'm not doing anything special. When I make stock I typically throw out the leftover meat and vegetables, but do I have to throwout the leftover beef? Aside from the beef I have boiled off the bones I do not have a lot of leftover meat and do not want to potentially waste what could be useable meat.

Taste the meat and if it still seems edible to you then there is no reason to throw it out.

When I make stock, I keep it on a simmer for much longer than three hours and any meat is completely tasteless by the time I'm done. Three hours, however, is about how long you would cook meat to make a stew, so it's quite possible that you could eat it.

On the other hand, not all cuts of meat stew well and I'm not familiar with this cut. If the meat has plenty of connective tissues (i.e. collagen) to gelatinise it shouldn't dry out too much. But the proof is in the pudding: taste it.


How to prepare an easy and fast snack rich in protein? I'm going to the gym, usually, everyday. I'm looking for a simple and easy snack, something that I can carry with me to work, to the office, and would help me to recover from my workout. :)

I know some recipes rich in carbohydrates but none rich in proteins :(
(Besides whey protein, of course)

Any tips or recommendation ?
Thanks in advance!

A hard boiled egg is high in protein and comes in a handy natural container.


What can I add to soften too hard peanut butter ice cream? My staff is having a hard time scooping our Peanut Butter Ice cream. It's too rock hard. We make the Ice cream in-house using a 15% Super Premium base.
I want to know what can I add to soften the ice Cream.
Here is the Recipe:

52 oz of liquid Peanut Butter
1 oz Vanilla Extract
2.5 Gallons of Ice Cream Base
We run the ice cream at max level 12 in our Caprigani Ice Cream Machine

The Stabilizers in the Base: Mono & Diglycerides, Cellulose Gum, Gaur Gum, Carrageenan, Dextrose, Silicone Dioxide to prevent caking.

Heat the scoop?

source

If you are serving lots of ice cream maybe you already have one of these.  If not it might come in handy.  The flowing water warms up the scoop which then more easily cuts its way thru the hard ice cream.


Looking for a recipe generator Possible Duplicate:
  How does one find recipes given an ingredient rather than the recipe name?

I'd like to get a recipe by given food (fridge content ;) )

After years of cooking, I don't really need this service anymore, but I sure did wish there was something good like this 5 years ago. I couldn't find anything then, though. However, I've seen a couple of sites pop up since then. I can't really testify to how well they work, because I haven't used any of them. But here are some things to explore:

Recipe Key - Lets you create your own pantry and then get matching recipes. This looks like it could be a really cool tool if you use it regularly as well as a good spot solution for inspiration.

Recipe Matcher - Lets you type in the ingredients you have for matches.

And now I need to run, so here are a couple more sites to check out:

Super Cook
All Recipes
Recipe Puppy
Yummly

Hope one of those helps. I think the first two (recipe key and recipe matcher) look like your best options. Let us know how you fare.


How is bean pasta so protein-rich? I've seen a number of bean pastas that have pretty close to a 1:1 protein/carb ratio. For example, this black bean pasta has 23g carbs and 25g protein per serving. On their own, black beans have a much lower protein/carb ratio (less than 1:2). Considering black beans are the only ingredient in the pasta, what accounts for the nutritional difference?

I can see three possibilities, though I don't know which is the actual case.

First, it is simply possible that the beans they source are, for some reason, very high in protein.   The general nutrition numbers are averages, and can cover some pretty broad ranges - a potentially significant difference might come from testing specific batch of organic black beans from whatever farming processes versus the generic averages of all black beans.

Second, it is possible that the processing of the beans into pasta does remove some of the carbs, for whatever reason - perhaps starches that get left behind in processing (in soaking water?), or the starches and proteins separated and recombined in different, predictable, ratios (possibly to account for the potential variability of bean batches).  Something similar is done with chocolate, the single ingredient is separated into constituent parts and recombined in predictable ratios, for a better and more consistent end product.

Third, it is possible that the ratio of carbs to proteins actually changes during the processing.  I'm thinking of gluten formation, specifically, where the gluten protein that is formed in the working the (wheat) dough wasn't there in the plain flour - and making something like seitan from it, which is very high in protein, by developing the protein already present and washing away excess starches. I'm not sure of the actual chemistry behind black bean pasta, but it may develop some protein, something, in the processing that wasn't there before, which might perhaps alter the ratios in the bean pasta as opposed to the simply cooked beans.


Is it possible to make homemade yogurt using chocolate milk? Making yogurt from a small quantity of live culture yogurt can be gussied up using cinnamon by adding the spice to the milk prior to boiling it.

Is it possible to make chocolate flavoured yogurt using boiled commercially made chocolate milk instead of boiled milk?

There is no reason why you can't turn chocolate milk into yogurt.  Now, much commercial chocolate milk has carrageenan added as a stabilizer.  If you get issues with  carrageenan separating out, you can also use  Torani chocolate syrup (intended to flavor coffees) to add the flavor to normal milk.


Stop my pot splashing me When I'm going to boil something, I'll set the water to boil while I prepare the food itself. When the water is boiling and my ingredients are ready, I turn to tip them in. But as I add the pieces of food, the volatile hot water splashes everywhere.

I can prevent this by carefully putting the food in piece by piece so that I only let go when it's not partially in the water. However this is an impractically slow method with lots of pieces to put in.

Besides that slow way, I haven't been able to stop this happening. No matter how much I add at a time, it still splashes because the food is falling in and causing a big disturbance in the surface of the water.

How could I prevent this happening?

Put in your food slowly, as you already discovered. If they are largish pieces, e.g. whole potatoes, you just need the patience for it. If you have a bowl of something small like beans, use a ladle to take scoops out of the bowl and lower it into the water.
In addition to 1, use a larger pot with higher sides, but don't fill it. A little bit of splash will happen, but it will not reach you or spill over your stove.

Also, I don't know what you mean by "boil something", but I suspect you may be blanching vegetables. If this is the case, I find it best to use a large sieve analogously to a fryer basket (boil in the sieve), else you can never get the whole amount in and out quickly enough to not undercook some pieces and overcook others.

For something almost "flowing" like rice or couscous, you can also find something spouted to measure them in, and slowly spread the food over the water from a low height. Basically, you really need the "slow" part, you cannot just throw everything and not get splashed.


Why does Chinese market take scales off the fish, & American does not? Where I live (California, USA), when I buy salmon fillets from the (American style) supermarket, they have scales on. Even though it is not too difficult, I don't enjoy removing the scales at home, partly because I don't like to handle the fish too much and get my hands all fishy smelling. Once I asked the butcher man if he could get the scales off for me, and he looked fishy at me and said no.

However, I notice in the Chinese markets (I think 3 different ones) they just sell the salmon already scaled. You don't even need to ask them specially. So now I just go to the Chinese market for salmon.

So my question is: Is this typical (other locations too)? And if so, why? Why the difference between Chinese and American style supermarkets regarding scales on salmon? FYI, the only fish I ever buy is salmon, so I do not know if this applies to other types of fish or not.

Maybe you have a bad fishmonger ? they do a bad job by not removing the scales?

Maybe the expect the regular clients not eating the skin?

Can't talk about California, but here in Montréal,  fish sold in supermarkets are scaled, especially if the fish is sold in portions.

It is harder to remove scales in filleted portions.


First time and small batch biryani I've dreamt of making biryani for some time, but have always felt intimidated by the layers and spices I'd need to buy.

Any ideas for a small pot version of biryani?

My friend's dad makes it sometimes, but he uses a pretty large pot.

(I'm in Ontario, Canada so we might not have any specialty spices available)

Look around in the areas with the South Asian community (Pakistani/Indian/Bangladeshi) to find ethnic stores for specialty spices.

Whatever recipe you use, reduce the ingredients proportionately like you would for any other recipe.

The only reason for a large pot is to make it easier to mix the rice and gravy after it's cooked. If you don't have a large pot available, you can use a wide pan (of adequate height) with a lid. Avoid using narrow stock pots. It will be difficult to mix the rice up in a small pot without breaking the rice.

--- Edit:

You can even find boxed spice mixes in the ethnic stores to save the pain of buying individual spices. You can find these on Amazon as well.


Out of Date Vine Leaves - are they safe to eat? I bought vacuum packed vine leaves quite some time ago. Stupidly didn't get round to using them so they are still in the fridge. They are well passed their sell by date of March 2011. Should I just bin them or do you think they are still fine to use? I think they look okay...

Thanks very much for your help!

Kate

They may be safe but they are certainly not guaranteed to be safe. see How long can I store a food in the pantry, refrigerator, or freezer.

Besides safety they have likely lost all consistency and won't taste well. You're propensity to prevent food waste is admirable, in this case however, it's best to bin them or better yet, compost them in a flowerpot (if they're not in acid or something).


Scaling up a risotto recipe x4. Things to consider? I am making risotto for a Christmas dinner, serving 20 people.
I plan to multiple the recipe by 3 or 4x.
Since risotto is a challenging dish at the normal scale, how can I ensure getting good results  when multiplying the recipe?

If you haven't done it before don't do this for Xmas day, it's not worth the risk. Always practise on less important occasions

You need a wider, rather than taller pot. Nearly a paella style pan. And a strong arm

Ingredients wise, I don't know of any magic scaling tricks for risotto

The hardest part is stirring enough, but not too much, and doing an even job of it

Probably easier to have two pots going at the same time, rather the one large pot. Then you can have two different flavours going!


Do storms influence the souring of dishes? The story/lore passed from generation to generation is about the influence of a storm on some dishes. Allegedly, they sour once the storm hits. This holds especially when the dish is kept in a metal bowl, jug, or pot. What I've heard is that it affects soups, broths and mayo-based salads the most, but I am not sure if that is because of their ingredients or just because they are mostly kept in those metal containers.

Is there any scientific proof of this phenomenon, and if so what is the mechanism? Is it due to rapid changes in the air pressure or maybe electrostatics?

If that would be true, how can one counteract it? Does keeping dishes in the fridge help?

The short answer is no, storms don't cause souring.  Souring occurs because of bacterial or yeast growth.  Sometimes this is desirable, sometimes not, depending on your goals.  If by "souring" you mean spoilage, proper sanitation and refrigeration are your best protections.  Sometimes the composition of a food container can impact the flavor of foods (tin and acidic dishes, for example).  That is why there are often instructions to use non-reactive containers. However, this has nothing to do with the weather.  Of course, ambient conditions, such as extremes in humidity or temperature, can impact the cooking process, when baking, for example...but storms don't accelerate or influence spoilage.


How does yeast feed on the water How and why does yeast grow and feed on the water? My children and I have been making yeast rolls and they keep asking why it expands,I don't know how to answer this and they are still waiting for an answer.

Yeast does not feed on water, it feeds on carbohydrates, i.e. sugar and flour.

If you got the impression that it feeds on water, it might be because you used dried yeast, which is basically dormant yeast that gets reactivated by the water.

If you use lukewarm water alone to activate your yeast, it feeds on the food remains from the growing medium, if you add a pinch or two of sugar (not too much!), you will see more vigourous bubbling.

Yeast has two types of metabolism, aerobic (with oxygen present) and anaerobic (without oxygen). Both metabolize sugar and create CO2 (the bubbles), the aerobic one also produces water, the anaerobic alcohol (think about wine, for example). The latter is also the predominant process in baking.

For a more kid-friendly explanation, which mine loved:

  Yeast eats sugar and burps CO2. Those bubbles get trapped in the dough and make it fluffy.

A few links with kid-oriented material and experiments:

http://sciencewithme.com/what-is-yeast/
http://redstaryeast.com/science-yeast/what-is-yeast/
http://redstaryeast.com/science-yeast/yeast-experiments/
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/watch-yeast-live-breathe/
http://www.kidsdiscover.com/teacherresources/science-of-yeast-for-kids/


Uses of dittany of Crete (origanum dictamnus) Last summer I went to Crete for a short vacation, and came back with fond memories of the local cuisine.

Before leaving I bought some spices, among them a small bag of diktamo (dittany, or dictamnus).

While the smell is quite nice, I found that it doesn't impart any discernible flavour to dishes.

I tried it in some recipes that call for oregano (homemade pizza, some pasta sauces), but I'm curious as to its use in Greek cuisine; maybe I'm just using it the wrong way.

In Greece we use diktamo mostly for tea, as beverage.
You can try it by boiling water in a jar and put 5-10gr diktamo for 5-10 minutes.
Other uses as any other tea leaves. For example you can boil milk or 35% milk cream  and put diktamo and then use the milk or cream to make pastry cream or ganache or any other similar.


Can you help me identify this appliance/tool? A friend of mine asked me to identify an appliance he saw in a picture from the Internet, and I was unable to do so.  Does anyone else know what this is?  I've highlighted it in the background of this image (it's the best picture I have):

It's the one with two handheld drawers on the bottom and conical hoppers up top that appear to be hinged at the bottom.  Given the rest of the items in this picture, perhaps it has something to do with coffee?  My guess is that it's a coffee roaster.

It looks like a rotary drum coffee roaster. I can't find any pictures of one that looks exactly like it though, so I may be wrong.


How to make Vegemite at home Could someone make their own? Vegemite is a yeast extract made from the remains of commercial beer production. Vegemite has an extreme salt level; a home made variant would probably lower the salt level to some extent. The broad intent would be to use the home made vegemite on toasted cheese sandwiches. A colour improvement would also be desirable: a cream coloured vegemite spread would be my choice.

No, you need industrial machinery.

Part of the manufacturing process of producing Vegemite involves using a centrifuge to separate out the yeast cell membranes from the rest of the product. As a result, without access to such a centrifuge, it is not possible to make Vegemite.

Here is a description of the process I found through a Google search:

  Spent brewer's yeast is sieved to get rid of hop resins, and washed to remove bitter tastes. Then it is suspended in water at a temperature greater than 37 C with no nutrients: the yeast cells die, and vitamins and minerals leach out. Then the proteolytic (protein-splitting) enzymes take over, breaking the yeast proteins down into smaller water-soluble fragments, which also leach out. The yeast cell membrane is unruptured during this time, and can be removed by centrifuging. The clear light brown liquid is then concentrated under a vacuum to a thick paste (the vacuum helps preserve flavours and vitamin B1, thiamine). It is seasoned with salt, and a small proportion of celery and onion extracts to increase the palatability.


Why is salt sometimes added to straight coffee? Sometimes a pinch of salt is added to a cup of coffee - but why?

Is this only done for low-quality or mediocre coffee?  When is the best time during the coffee-making process to do this?

I'm not a coffee drinker, so can't comment on the timing -- but it's due to salt's effect of masking bitterness.


What do I search for when looking for unsweetened recipes? This has frustrated me immensely. I want to find recipes for things like savory granola that contain neither added sugar nor any kind of sweetener like rice syrup.  However, recipes on the internet seem to include some kind of sweetener despite saying they are sugar free. Presumably they mean no added refined sugar, but sugar is sugar no matter where it comes from and I'm afraid I just don't like it. (No health reasons, I just really want to not eat sweet things sometimes).

So what do I search for? "Sugar free" gives me a bunch of artificial sweeteners recipes and "no sugar" leads me to recipes with syrups or dates or something that contains a lot of sugar anyway.

As pointed out in the comments, the correct search term is "savory."  Keep in mind, however, that while chefs often create savory versions of typically sweetened items, those versions usually have sugar or other sweeteners in them.  In granola, for example, we understand it generally as a sweet breakfast or snack item.  While the sweetness in the savory version is dramatically reduced, it is that remaining sweetness that allows us to interpret it as granola.  Otherwise, it would just be toasted grains, which, maybe in the end, is what you want.


Can I salvage cookie dough made with whole eggs instead of yolks? I was making the dough for cookies and was supposed to add just 2 egg yolks and I added 2 whole eggs.  What was supposed to form a ball just made a really thick batter.  So, do I have to start over or is there a way I can fix this?

Recipe called for 4 cups of flour, 2 cups of softened butter, 1 pint of sour cream and 2 egg yolks.  I put in two whole eggs.  It's in the refrigerator chilling in hopes of tightening it up.

They were supposed to be pinwheel cookies that you put a bit of jelly in the center.  And then finish off with powder sugar. If there is no salvaging the consistency of the cookies to form these pinwheels, would it work if I make them into balls and then finish them off with powdered sugar so as to not waste this batch and start over to make the pinwheels with just the yolks?

If nothing else, the egg whites have added additional liquid to your dough, so maybe you can compensate by adding more flour.

Try taking a small portion of your "batter" and add a little flour to it. See if that brings it closer to the consistency you expected. If you can determine how much flour is needed to fix just a small amount of the mix, then you can apply it to the whole thing.

If it doesn't work, you'll still have your Plan-B to fall back on.


How to get ants out of bread loaves? So, yesterday I forgot bread loaves on a table and in the evening found tiny red ants crawling on the loaves all over.

I tried to dust them off, but some of them went into hiding in pits of the bread.

Is there some practical method to get the ants out of the bread loaves?

I assume that this is a bread loaf with one side cut open and in addition, you dusted off all ants that you could see from outside.  Ants cannot go too far into a bread loaf through the open end.  You can cut another piece off from the open end and use the remaining loaf.  (If you do not mind using the piece where ants were, then you could remove the ants easily from the cut piece now.  I would not mind eating it as this is what typically happens in tropical regions.)

As a solution to not letting ants get on the bread in the first place,
(1) you could place it in a plastic bag and form a knot so that ants cannot get through.  or
(2) Place the bread on top of a cylindrical object (for example, a used powdered milk container) and place the object (and the bread) in a (big enough) bowl (a wok) with water.  Make sure that no parts of the cylindrical object are touching the lateral surface of the bowl.


Saucepan in the oven? I am cooking some meat for tonight, and my girlfriend put the saucepan into the oven. It seems to be working fine, but I wonder what the advantages and disadvantages of this method is compared to just using the stove?

Generally oven cooking gives a more even, surrounding heat rather than the direct and concentrated heat from below that a hob supplies.


Baking in a salt crust: What type of fish? I am looking to bake a whole pollock (Pollachius pollachius or lieu jaune) in a salt crust. I have done this several times before with a sea bass/branzino or with a (gilt-head) sea bream and was always very happy with the result.
For some reason however, I don't think I have ever come across a similar recipe for pollock and I have been wondering if there is a reason for that. Is the salt crust baking technique appropriate for some fish in particular and which ones? Is there a reason not to try it with pollock?

James Peterson, in his book Fish & Shellfish, recommends char, blackfish, grouper, ocean perch, rockfish, small salmon, trout, steelhead, and striped bass, but not pollock.  However, he does say "almost any round fish can be prepared this way", and pollock is a round fish.
I suspect that the reasons that you don't see pollock suggested for cooking this way, or for that matter any way other than fried, is because the fish has a reputation for being delicate, but also slightly fishy, and drying out easily.  So the risk of cooking it in a salt crust is that it could end up both dried out and extra-fishy tasting.  On the other hand, salt-dried cod is its own staple ingredient in a lot of cuisines, and pollock is closely related.
In my personal experience, freshness and quality count for a lot, regardless of fish variety.  If I had a couple really good, fresh, whole pollock, I'd probably try it, particularly if they are Alaska instead of Atlantic pollock.


How do I convert a recipe from a stew to use a slow-cooker How do I convert a recipe given as a slow-boiled stew to a slow-cooker recipe?  I assume that liquid amounts and probably onions and other flavorings need to change.  What are those changes?  What proportions?  Are there particular ingredients I should watch out for?

Stewing or braising is essentially what slow cookers do, so there is not a huge difference in converting a stew recipe.

There are two main issues to consider:

Flavor development.  You may choose to sear or brown your ingredients separately, and then deglaze for your base sauce.  Most slow cookers cannot create the browning, so it would need to be done separately.
Liquid level.  If your original recipe stews with an open lid, you will get less evaporation in the slow cooker, so may want to reduce the liquid slightly to compensate.


Wouldn't this cake batter be too runny? Would the coffee affect the texture? I came across What purpose does coffee serve in a chocolate cake recipe? as a similar  question to one I'd just asked about baking.

Looking at the recipe she provided there, wouldn't the amount of liquid (coffee, buttermilk, oil, and eggs) to solid (flour, sugar, and cocoa powder) make it a very runny batter?  It's 4 1/3 cups liquid plus 3 eggs to 6 1/2 cups solid (if I count the sugar as a solid).  It just seems like a lot of liquid to solid.  Maybe the coffee being hot does something?

Compare that recipe to this very similar one from Ina Garten (complete with handy video) Chocolate Buttermilk Cake. Watch her pour. No question, that is a wet batter. Apparently it works fine, Ina's recipe is very highly rated.

Both recipes use volumetric measurements (ugh), so I'll use cups.

Ina's recipe (sugar is wet (sort of), subject for another question) - Wet ingredients (2 + 1 + .5 + 1 + .5 (eggs) = 5 cups wet to 2.5 cups dry (flour plus cocoa) 5/2.5 = 2

Your recipe: Wet ingredients (2.5 + 1.5 + 1.33 + 1.5 + .75 (egg) =  7.58 cups wet to 4 cups dry (flour plus cocoa) 7.58/4 = 1.9

So they're very close, Ina's actually a bit "wetter".

I am not aware of anything special the coffee would do to the baking chemistry here. It's got some acid, but I don't think that is relevant. As far as the "wetness" of the batter, it's the same as water as far as I know. The temperature might help dissolve the sugar, but that would be a minor thing at best.


USA analogue of EU Gastronorm standard What is the standard for kitchenware tray and container sizes in the USA, that is the analogue of the Gastronorm standard in EU? For instance the standard sizes used in salad bars.

I haven't been able to find an official standard for US sized pans... the wikipedia even state : "used worldwide except in the United States, which has its own domestic system" but does not link to any reference to that system.
This seems to indicate that the Gastronorm was based on existing US standard :
"At this meeting the basic size of 530 x 325 mm, already in use with American standard steamable pans, was accepted."
This lists a series of sizes that seem to be accepted nationally in the USA and says that : "Gastronorm sizes are comparable to American sizes and can generally be interchanged." (bold by me)
So you can safely use GN sized pans everywhere.


Spice combination(s) excluding salt, oil/butter, sugar, msg, vinegar, onion/garlic/alliums? What spice combination(s) work well for someone who (for health reasons) can't have salt, oil/butter, sugar, msg, vinegar, or alliums (onions, garlic, etc)? This person is additionally (for religions reasons) a lacto-vegetarian.

There is the French quatre épices (four spices): pepper, cloves, nutmeg and ginger. And of course you can go crazy with the herbs: parsley, basil, rosemary, sage.
French again: bouquet garni, look it up here.

Let me just add something about the MSG: monosodium glutamate is practically everywhere (tomatoes, cheese, seaweed, ...), not just in Chinese cuisine or soy sauce. If you really cannot eat MSG, your choices are going to be extremely limited. Read more here.

Broadening the field of your question, you could look into culinary traditions that, for religious or philosophical reasons, eschew those ingredients. Some Indian cuisines might help you here, but I am definitely not an expert.


Does chilli get milder with cooking? I have made a tomato, onion and cannelini bean curry.  I put a lot of chilli spice in it, perhaps too much.  If I keep simmering it, will it get milder?  I'm hoping it will cook into the (bland) beans.

You'll sometimes hear television cooking show hosts describe what they're doing as "cooking out" the paste. What they're actually doing is altering the flavor of the chili itself, not manipulating the level of capsaicin that was introduced. If you take a typical chili paste which has been combined with garlic and other things and then saute it in a fat, you will lower the level of heat that's tasted (and possibly take some bitterness out, depending on the chili and what's in the paste), but not lower the level that's actually ingested.

If you literally want to cook it out, put some sliced chili with nothing else in a searing hot pan, but make sure no one else is home or going to be home for a while, and wear a respirator. The capsaicin has nowhere to go and vaporizes as it burns (seriously, don't do that, if you did that in my kitchen I'd throw a live crab at you).

Various kinds of fat bond well with the capsaicin, essentially creating a sort of encasement. To demonstrate how this works, grab some sriracha and some cream. Mix in about half a tablespoon of sriracha to about 300 ml of cream, taste it. Now, simmer the cream a bit (about 3 - 5 minutes), take it off the heat, let it rest a few minutes and taste it again. The level of sriracha didn't change, what happened is the cream got its hands on the capsaicin that it contained. It'll continue to get milder the longer it sits. That's why a glass of milk can rescue you from atomic hot wings and why water just broadens the pain as it makes sure your whole palate gets a chance to taste it :) Beer just makes you care less about it.

Now, sugar has the remarkable quality of helping to hide heat with its mighty right of first refusal when it comes to your palate. The heat from the chili shows up and your palate says "what? I'm too busy with this sweet, I can only listen to a little of you". To see how that works, repeat the experiment again, but this time throw a teaspoon or so of confectioner's (or castor) sugar into the cream with the sriracha, along with an additional squirt or two (around 10 ml) of sriracha. That's why coconut milk works so perfectly in a curry.

The best bet for your recipe is finding a way to get some kind of fat into it. That could be coconut milk, fatty bacon, or whatever makes sense based on how you want to serve it. Then, optionally, sweeten it up a bit (also remember that citrus helps offset sweet, handy to keep that in mind when you're 'fixing' a dish) - some raisins sound like they'd work rather well with what you're doing. Maybe go with coconut milk and raisins, and thin it out with a bit of chicken stock if needed?

I really try to encourage people to take an hour and just experiment with ways you can alter and sort of control chili, because it is a lovely thing to cook with. Just remember, whatever you put in the pan initially ends up being eaten, you're just hiding a bit of that as you cook.


Does reducing the clear juice from tomatoes have a name? I have been cooking a very light tomato topping for tortellini using dicing tomatoes.  I saute them very briefly until the flesh begins to soften, then remove the pieces from the pan leaving whatever juice cooked out of the tomatoes there.  This liquid is then reduced until it is a syrup, and recombined with the pieces.

Does this technique have a name?  Is it weird?

You've already given the name for this process in your question. Reduction is the cooking term used for thickening and intensifying the flavor of a food by simmering or boiling away some of the liquid.


How can I use these peaches in a box cake mix? I have a box of Super Moist cake mix, butter recipe Yellow.  It calls for 1 cup of water, 1/3 cup butter, softened, and 3 eggs. I also have a 15 ounce can of Sliced peaches. How can I combine these for cupcakes?

We are moving in a month and I'd rather find a way to eat the peaches than m move them.  Lol

I bet you can puree some peaches and their juice to use in place of the butter and water, respectively. Although, the texture might be better if you only replace half of the butter.  I wouldn't recommend replacing the eggs with peaches because that would make the cake quite crumbly.  Note that the peaches can make the cake a lot sweeter, especially if they're canned in heavy syrup.

Perhaps a better use would be to turn the peaches into an ice cream or sorbet to serve with the cake.  You could also add a small amount of peach to some butter and powdered sugar to make a buttercream frosting for the cake.


Is there any way for me to reheat mini beef wellingtons without toughening the meat? I've been asked to bring an appetizer to Thanksgiving dinner and my father requested that I make him my beef wellington so I'm wanting to try a bite-sized version. It's a family potlock and there won't be time to cook a dish but we'll keep the oven at 350F and use it to warm dishes as needed.

Although my mini wellingtons will be fairly small (about 1.5" cubes) I'm concerned that the `10 minutes it will take to bring them to a proper temperature will overtoughen the meat inside.

Do I have any reasonable options or should I consider a different dish?

Very doable, you just have to fool around with them a little.

Watch the meat carefully, and check the internal temperature in several pieces with a meat thermometer, as they're heating. If you're concerned about a hot spot in the oven, you can rotate the pan every couple of minutes. Pull from the oven once they've reached serving temp. Remember they'll continue heating for a couple of minutes once they're resting.


Cookies are too sweet I made chocolate chip cookies and added too much brown sugar. The cookies are too sweet. I've used real butter and real chocolate chips. Does anyone have any ideas?

You might be able to overcome the sweetness by adding a tart glaze to the cookies (lemon or lime), but I don't know how well that'll go with the chocolate chips.  Another option would be to crush them up to make a yogurt parfait (made with plain, unsweetned yogurt).

You might also consider some of the options mentioned in What can I use hard, crunchy, leftover cookie-mistakes for?


Can you freeze bread dough when it's done proofing to bake later? Has anyone put bread dough in the freezer overnight (covered), and then tried to bake it straight out of the freezer?

I believe you can put it in the fridge, and then straight into the oven from there without issues.

I am wondering specifically two things:

Would the bread's structure/flavor be compromised by freezing?
Would the middle not cook enough?

The state change from freezing to non freezing takes much more energy than warming the temperature
The dough as a whole would be colder than any fridge proofed loaf

I also intend to try this in the next few days, so I will update regardless

Seth, I make pizza dough all the time.
I make about 4-6 rounds each time and then freeze them. It works just fine!

My method:
Depending on your dough, you need several stages of proofing. With pizza dough, I generally do the fast, slow, and extra slow method. Meaning it starts at the optimal temp for a fast rise within a warm and moist environment. The second is less warm and still moist. The moisture comes from a damp cloth or covered container/bowl. The third rise comes after. I roll the dough into small balls (or whatever shape you desire for bread) and then placing them in the fridge on a plate with some plastic wrap over the top.

Now, the third step is when I decide which pizza dough balls are the lucky ones. I'll freeze the rest that don't make it in the fridge. !!The important part is that the shape is intact when you freeze it.!!

This nearly stops or completely stops the proofing process of the dough. When I want to make more pizza, I take the dough out the night before and let the final proofing stage begin.

Note: I have found that this method works perfectly within 2-3 weeks of putting the dough in the freezer. I got mixed results after that time period where the dough would sometimes become thin and cracker-like. Still good pizza! But not the best.

Hope this helps! I've been making pizza dough for over 12 years. @Restaurants and @home.


Pyrex Percolator on stove? Does anybody use a vintage Pyrex percolator on their stove?  Electric? Gas?  Is it 100% safe?  I just saw it in an old movie, which is what gave me the idea to look for one.

Pyrex percolators made after 1940 were not intended to be used directly on a heating element as stoves made after 1940 had a higher burner heat level that those made in previous years. (Presumably, those made before 1940 were placed directly on a burner.)

The Pyrex percolators I remember had a wire 'grid' or 'heat spreader' that was to be placed on the burner and then the percolator sat directly on that. If memory serves me correctly, they came in a variety of shapes. See below for an example.


What Makes Bread Gray? I've been baking French-style bread loaves (not baguettes) for years.  The ingredients are flour, salt, water, yeast, and about one tbsp cornstarch per cup of flour.  For the last year or so, the inside of the loaves has sometimes been gray rather than white, but with little or no change in the taste.  I have not changed ingredients nor preparation technique.  Flour has been King Arthur bread flour for years.  I am at a loss to explain the change.

I'm in Atlanta, about 1,000 feet above sea level.  Earlier this summer, I made bread every day for two weeks at a beach house party, using equipment and ingredients brought from home.  Every loaf turned out perfect, with no hint of gray.  I have no idea why that might make a difference.  (There's an electric oven at the beach, gas at home, but I made perfect, or at least white, bread with the gas oven for many years before this problem started.)

Also, if I cut into a loaf right after it comes from the oven, it's always white.  The graying process seems to happen over a couple of hours.  (I bake in the afternoon for an evening dinner.)

Edited October 5 to add: Additional data points: I've bought a three-loaf baguette pan with perforated bottom and I've been using it for about a month.  No gray bread.  I've introduced three new variables:

Three loaves of about 260 g unbaked weight instead of two at 390-400 g unbaked.
The pan is non-stick aluminum instead of black steel.
The pan that produced the gray loaves was not perforated.

Ingredients and preparation, except for forming three loaves, are exactly the same. I'm not sure whether I've learned anything or simply confused matters even further.

What kind of salt are you using?

In the presence of iodine, starch can turn a surprisingly purplish-black color. This phenomenon has be leveraged for many decades in medical examiners' offices, to help determine the contents of a last meal in a cadaver (pardon the unappetizing digression).

Iodine is an essential nutrient, vital for the proper functioning of our thyroid (read more about Iodine Deficiency) that has relatively few ways of entering our bodies through our diet other than through shellfish, meats, eggs, and some dairy products.

One way to combat the problems of iodine deficiency is its addition to our salt, which we consume in predictable quantities and never goes bad. Table salt contains up to 25mg/kg of iodine and that number has been on the rise since its safety and helpfulness have been demonstrated repeatedly. Sea salt contains some iodine, as it is naturally occurring in the ocean, but in a much smaller quantity.

Maybe when you were at the beach, your salt supply changed to sea salt or an uniodized version and and when you returned and used the regular Iodized Morton's or Iodized sea salt.


Convection/Steam cooking in a Normal Oven? A recipe that I am trying says that it's very important I follow the instructions to the letter. However, at one point it says "Each loaf should bake at 300 degrees Fahrenheit in convection/steam oven for approximately 40 minutes or until the loaf reaches 155 degrees internal temperature."

However, I only have a Normal Oven, not a convection/steam oven. Can I still cook this recipe? Or, do I need to buy a new oven?

I like to use the 15% rule.  To convert a recipe from convection to conventional:

Multiply the cook time by 1.15.
Multiply the heat by 1.15

For example, your recipe would become:

"Each loaf should bake at (300*1.15 = 345) degrees Fahrenheit in convection/steam oven for approximately (40*1.15=46) minutes or until the loaf reaches 155 degrees internal temperature."

You can convert back by multiplying by .85.


how early can I put food into a slow-cooker? I am considering getting a slow-cooker.  I leave for work by 8am, return about 4pm and feed my family dinner about 5pm.  Can food sit in the slow cooker that long?
Thanks.

Yes.  A typical slow cooker's low setting ranges between 8-10 hours, which is within the range of your listed times.

All (or nearly all) slow cookers come with a removable ceramic bowl/insert that the food cooks in.  Most families do most of the preparation in the evening, putting everything into that bowl, and putting the bowl into the refrigerator.  Then when they wake up in the morning, they put the bowl back into the slow cooker and start it up.

Your bigger concern should be what size of slow cooker to get.  If you don't fill up that ceramic bowl to at least 1/2-2/3's full, you can end up burning the entire dinner.


How do you dry homemade lollipops so that they are no longer sticky? I made homemade lollipops and they are set, but still sticky.  How can I dry them, or what I can do so that when I wrap them they won't stick to the wrappers?

As far as I know, drying is not necessary the option.
In general, lollipops from the industry are coated with some edible powder, like starch. This prevents the sticking part.