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23595 | What's best: boil eggs in advance or just before use?
If I want to eat a hard-boiled egg every day of the week, should I boil them and store them (refrigerated) all at once or should I keep raw eggs in the fridge and hard-boil them just before use?
Edit: by best I mean the acceptable trade-off between saving time and energy vs. shelf-life and taste. I mentioned a working week to limit the scope to 5 days, i.e. how much would a hard-boiled egg's taste and texture degrade after 5 days on the fridge?
Never had trouble with either of the two methods. Cold eggs are not very tasty though.
possible duplicate of How long can I store a food in the pantry, refrigerator, or freezer?
If you boil them all at once, you'll certainly save a lot of time (and probably energy as well).
Your question would be more answerable if you defined what "best" meant. Do you want to extend shelf life? Save time? Save energy? Are cold eggs acceptable for you to consume or would you want to reheat them? People with different answers to these questions would have different "best"s
By your definition, I would cook them all at one time. From there you have a couple options.
Leave them in the shell and peel when needed. This keeps out a lot of the air which extends the shelf life to 2 weeks, but can dry them out a little making the texture a little harder.
Immediately peel and dry them as best as possible. Put them in a Zip Lock along with a dry paper towel on the bottom to catch any extra water and condensation. Remove as much air as possible. The texture is much better, but your shelf life if approx. 1 week and is a little smellier. (also can put zip lock into a covered container) Lol. Food stores now sell eggs this way.
Either way you may want to let them sit on the counter long enough to take the chill off, so it's not as hard. For me it doesn't matter, I can eat them any old way. LOVE EM!
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38167 | What can I do with the fat skimmed from chicken stock?
Two days ago I prepared some chicken stock. During the preparation, I took care to skim the grayish foam (as per procedure) and all went well. I usually freeze it for future use but this time I didn't have the time, so I put the stock in the fridge.
Later on I noticed a thin yellowish crust formed at the top of the cold stock. My guess is that it's fat that separated from the rest of the stock, so I skimmed it and saved it.
Is it really fat?
What can I do with it?
Should I return it to the rest of the stock?
Would the lack of fat adversely affect the stock?
Yes, it is really chicken fat rendered during the stock making process.
Called schmaltz in Yiddish, it is an ingredient in its own right. For example, you can use it to fry foods, or instead of butter in creating a roux, when you would like the chickeny flavor it provides. It is a key ingredient in matzo balls, and similarly, makes spectacularly good dumplings of various sorts. You can refrigerate it for several months, tightly covered.
It is not necessary to return it to the stock, although you may use it as an additional ingredient in the dishes you make with the stock.
Stocks are normally defatted anyway, so you do not need to return it to your stock.
Schmaltz isn't usually prepared boiling poultry, but melting the fat on a pan over low heat
@belisarius: What's your source for this? My mother and grandmother both made their schmaltz when making soup, and never by rendering the fat from the chicken over low heat. The historical reason for this is that one simply does not have chickens to "waste" just on making schmaltz, and it was an important byproduct. Whenever making something with as expensive (again, historically) an ingredient as chicken, one would use the whole bird.
@razumny Oh, ok. Probably my grandmother got her recipe from Wikipedia :) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schmaltz
Can't say it's schmaltz but my father who was Hungarian used to save chicken skin from the butcher and 'cook' it in a stove-top pan on the lowest heat possible, rendering the fat out. It had a different smell than fat from soup stock. Personally, I thought it nicer.
Yes, that is fat. I can a lot of chicken meat from stewing hens and simmer 30 hens at a time in a large boil pot. Afterwards I chill the broth and peel a thick layer of fat from the top, clarify the fat by heating it on the stovetop to drive away any moisture, and strain it through flour sack towels into pint jars and freeze it. It comes out as white as pork lard, but with a chicken smell. I use it like butter or in dishes that could use some fat. Sometimes it replaces the butter in mac and cheese, sometimes I just spread it on bread. Earlier today I spread it on some lefse, wrapped some Spam slices up in the lefse, and had a wonderful sandwich.
Excited for this new new lefse sandwich preparation :)
Stock with the fat is usually considered more valuable than one without it.
You may remove it if you need it for other purposes or want to keep your stock low-calorie, but otherwise it holds some flavor which will be removed if you remove it.
I am a fan of old cookbooks and one of my favorite really old ones claims that the best lemon or orange cookies are made with poultry fat. I assume one would have to melt the fat unflavored since no one wants a cookie that tastes like stock or soup vegetables.
I am a bit at a loss whether to consider that an answer. Are you suggesting to use the skimmed fat for the cookies (as in the first sentence) or not to do it (as in the second sentence)?
I, too, am confused by that answer. If you used the chicken fat (as suggested in the first sentence), how could anything baked with it NOT have a poultry/vegetable flavor?
@Marlene You can definitely use unflavored fat rendered from meat in baked goods without a strong flavor coming through, e.g. lard in pie crusts. I've never tried chicken specifically, though, or with fat from stock with all the other flavors in it.
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12262 | Does Splenda caramelize?
Do any of you know if splenda caramelizes and melts like regular sugar? My parents are doing a low-carb, low-sugar diet and I'd love to surprise them with some diet-friendly hard candies.
Your real question might be "how can I make hard candy without sugar", I suppose, though I'm a little scared of what the real answer might be.
It's my understanding that sucralose (what makes Splenda sweet) is REALLY sweet, so much of what's in a measure of Splenda is fillers to bring the volume up so similar amounts of sugar and Splenda sweeten things a similar amount. I very much doubt that the fillers would behave as sugar does in a candy.
You can bake with it in situations where sugar isn't chemically necessary for the success of the dish, but otherwise it's not much like sugar.
Sugar-free candies that use sucralose most likely have a bunch of other stuff in them that is the "hard candy" part, and the sucralose is only the sweetener.
Splenda does not work for making hard candies, I learned this the hard way. I tried to make peanut brittle for my grandmother and it turned into a sticky mess... twice. I thought maybe I did something wrong the first time, but after looking it up discovered that splenda (even the boxes branded "for baking") will not be good for candy making.
I think the only sweetener that has candy-making properties like sugar is Isomalt. You should check if Isomalt is allowed in their diet.
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40556 | How best to toast/brown marzipan?
The recipe/picture that I'm following calls for cutting out Christmas stars from marzipan and for the stars to be browned somewhat (does look nice).
Last time I did this, the stars deformed quite a lot and lost the sharpness of their points, as the marzipan melted and softened.
So, for something prone to melting like marzipan is it best to toast quickly / high heat or more gradually? Any ideas?
I'm just grilling them under heat.
Please give a link, but I suspect it is far more likely the marzepan was painted with food coloring, or had food coloring kneaded in.
Yes, marzipan will melt if you attempt to brown it in an oven. Try using a torch to 'brulee' it, or add some sugar on top and caramelize.
Either use a blow torch or a very hot grill. Either way be very careful as it can burn extremely easily. I've only ever done it with balls of marzipan (on top of a simnel cake), so haven't had deformation issues, but I would suggest blowtorching the marzipan in the cutter, then letting it cool to prevent the points softening.
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530 | How do I make a "baking powder" substitute in a pinch?
Every once in while we run out of "Baking powder".
What would be a good recipe for a substitute that you have used that works well?
See also http://cooking.stackexchange.com/questions/4/what-is-the-difference-between-baking-soda-and-baking-powder/40#40
Also see also: http://cooking.stackexchange.com/questions/46904/making-baking-powder-substitute-with-baking-soda-and-powdered-citric-acid
On the off-chance that you have no baking powder, but you do have baking soda and cream of tartar, you can make your own baking powder:
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons cream of tartar
1 teaspoon corn starch (optional)
Mix it all together and use it immediately.
Reference: http://frugalliving.about.com/od/condimentsandspices/r/Baking_Powder.htm
It's important to note that homemade forms of baking powder need to be treated like recipes using only baking soda....they MUST go into the oven immediately otherwise the carbon dioxide bubbles will rise to the surface and pop, releasing the gas to the atmosphere instead of trapping it inside the baked goods. The result will be a dense heavy texture.
Commercial baking powders allow muffins to be made the night before, scooped into a pan and then baked the next morning because the greater bulk of gas production occurs during the baking process when a heat-activated dry acid produces gas.
Thanks for the comments about home-made "Baking powder"!! I wonder if Julia Child ever wrote on this. One thing that I really like about Julia Child, is that she would test, test, test till the recipe really work.
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93928 | What is the best alternative for tomatoes in chicken curry?
Some peoples do not like tomatoes in chicken curry. What alternative should I use instead of using tomatoes?
Tomatoes can be a fairly fundamental part of a curry, and attempting to substitute them would change the dish radically. I suggest instead you look for a recipe that doesn't use them in the first place (sauces based on things like yoghurt, slow-cooked onions, or coconut). You could use a similar mix of spices to your favourite tomato based recipe, but it would still be very different overall.
You may find that people like well-cooked and blended/chopped/sieved tomatoes even if they wouldn't like fresh tomatoes cut up and added towards the end of cooking (I'm not keen on nearly raw tomato myself). In this case using tinned tomatoes instead of fresh could be sufficient.
Tomatillos also make an interesting substitute: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomatillo#Tomatillo_as_food
I have tried adding other acidic ingredients, such as lemon, to compensate for what tomato adds to a curry. It doesn't work with dairy, but it does work with nut-based milks (coconut and cashew are my go-to for curry). It won't substitute anything by itself, but it still helps balance out the flavour profile that's thrown outta wack from lack of tomato.
I have anecdotally observed warm spices we associate with tomatoes can set our expectations to imagine tomatoes where there are none. Try increasing the spices and vegetables in the curry that are common to other tomato sauces as well! Red chili is a safe bet if you're already using lemons to add acidity.
You want to find things that fill in the blanks of missing ingredients, on a case-by-case basis, when you dedicate yourself to substitution. Most creative people are aware of this, but what separates reasonable logic from creative genius is your ability to triangulate with related recipes to find variables you can plug different stuff into. In the same manner, this process can be as intuitive or technical as you want! It's all about consistent practice, experimentation, and proper feedback. That's what I keep telling myself during the process of food magic ;)
Tomato paste, according to menu, ie 2/3tbl spoons per 500grm meat. Can add a squirt of tomato sauce for that hint of sweet at end before serving.
Why would you add tomato paste if people don't want tomatoes?
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91776 | How to melt sugar evenly?
I tried melting some sugar for a sesame caramel bar, but I could't manage to melt it evenly, and I have no idea why.
What I did was:
I turned the heat on the hot-plate at 2 (out of 4) and put a thick pan on.
I put the sugar in - the layer was about 1/2 to 1cm.
It started melting alright but there was unmelted sugar left on the top, so I tried swirling it (as I've read I should do in that case) but it didn't seem to do anything. I was afraid it might start burning so I tried putting the melted sugar on the top of the unmelted sugar (again according to the instructions) with a spoon, but that didn't work well - it started hardening in lumps.
I managed to melt it somehow and removed it from the heat when it started turning brownish, even though there were still some small lumps left.
The bar I was making turned out quite well despite of this, but I'd still like to know how to melt sugar properly.
Welcome to Seasoned Advice! ;-) Depending on the recipe: *Add butter/oil". Could you [edit] the question and add the entire recipe?
Some people/recipe suggest adding a little bit of water at the start to help dissolve the sugar.
Have a lookskie at "wet caramel"
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62409 | Do I have to cure a fresh ham before smoking?
I have a fresh ham. Do I need to cure it somehow before I put it in the stove-top smoker?
Trying to smoke a fresh ham will result in something that tastes like cooked pork. You may impart some smokey crust on the outside, but it will still taste like cooked pork.
Curing and then smoking is the only way to give a true smoked ham flavor, and please learn about curing a fresh ham, a cure applied to the outside of a fresh ham will not penetrate to the bone of a ham.
Roger
Thank you now I will just have to figure out how to cure it
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96424 | Tamarind Pulp Gritty
After soaking and sieving the tamarind through a fine mesh strainer, the remaining pulp has some grit. It kinda ruined my dish. Wonder if there’s any method that would get rid of the grit, maybe a second sieving?
What do you mean by "grit"? Like sand?
Are you asking for a method to get rid of the grit from your already prepared dish or the remaining pulp? Try lining the strainer with a cheesecloth to catch the bits from pulp next time.
Ive had that before. Use a chinore to get a finer strain.
Sieving through multiple layers of cotton cloth should do the job.
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58120 | Deep freezing paneer (cottage cheese)?
I have a packet of cottage cheese ( paneer ) and it advises me not to deep freeze it? I can't understand why. Any help? I had it deep frozen right from the time I bought it. It is also 3 days past its 'best before' date. Can I still use it?
I live in one of the largest cheese producing areas in the US. Freezing cheese is often frowned upon here, it often changes the texture of the cheese and can alter the flavor as well. Cheese, much like anything else, can freezer burn. Firmer cheeses typically are affected the least by being frozen. You'll probably see a lot of the whey separate out of the cheese upon thawing, and the texture will likely be different and much drier. Its completely possible to freeze the cheese, and it poses no health risks, but it will most definitely reduce the quality of your cheese.
A "best before" date is exactly as its stated, its best to eat if before the provided date with a concern for quality rather than health risks, however storage conditions make a big difference. As far as food safety, cheese tends to remain safe to eat until visible mold/fungi appears on the cheese. Though I say use your best judgement, and if you don't feel comfortable eating it then you should discard it, or to reduce waste compost it for your garden.
I have seen frozen paneer before. It is certainly not a good Idea to Freeze it. It turns yellow(off-whitish, due to the acids used in separation of cheese from milk) and loses texture ( as mentioned by @tsturzl ). When you thaw it if you find a lot of difference in taste and smell than that would be because it's past best before date. Paneer normally has very mild sour-milky odor with firm white texture and tastes bit like tofu bit milder.
Personally I always buy multiple packages when on sale and freeze the stuff. I take it out of the freezer the day before I want to use it. It stays firm and tasty. The longest I've kept it in the freezer was about two months.
Paneer when deep-frozen loses its texture and taste. It is supposed to be soft and supple. It does not thaw well.
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57041 | How to fry tortillas for poori?
Whenever I deep fry tortillas to use as poori (as in halwa poori) it becomes very crispy and hard. I want to know how can I keep ot soft?
I use uncooked tortillas.
I admit that I don't know much about Indian cuisine, but somehow this situation sounds strange. Are you sure that it is supposed to be soft, because deep fried things are normally hard and crispy? And if it indeed has to be soft, are you sure that it can be done with a tortilla?
I don't know about this general case, but in general : (1) Don't cook it as long. (2) Serve it before it has a chance to steam out or cool off.
Flour or corn tortillas? Are you making them yourself? I have never seen uncooked tortillas in a store.
Local groceries in the SW USA have raw flour tortillas. It's also easy enough to find masa prepared for corn tortillas. I suspect OP is using flour tortillas. Raw flour tortillas only need about 30 seconds on a dry, clean griddle.
It's a late answer, but I do this all the time when I'm feeling lazy and don't want to make traditional roti. Heat up oil to 300 to 350 in a skillet .about 2 inches of oil. Or use your deep fryer at 350, just make sure it's large enough. The most important thing is your oil needs to be up to temperature. As soon as you toss in the tortilla it should automatically pop and bubble up .count to 15 seconds and flip for 10 more seconds....let it drain on paper towels in a large bowl and cover with a kitchen towel to let the steam seep back in to keep it soft and moist....if it's crunchy it's because your oil wasn't hot enough or it just sat too long frying...the while frying process shouldn't exceed 25 seconds.
By the way I used the burrito tortilla flour type. Burritos are bigger.
A tortilla is always going to get hard when deep fried as it's very thin and dry. There's no air or moisture to puff up in a tortilla, so I don't see how you would be able to make authentic poori with them. I've never made them myself but my understanding is that you need to make a dough, roll it to about 1cm thick and fry it.
While preparing the dough, add a tablespoon of semolina that's already been soaked in warm water and a little sugar. You are sure to get your pooris to puff up. Its a thumb rule for preparing pooris. They'll be crisp when fried but cool down and become soft.
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82473 | How can I preserve Jamun (Indian blackberry) without sugar?
I want to save jamun fruit for a diabetic person so I can't add sugar. Is there any means to store it for 6 months or so by adding salt/lemon or any other thing except sugar?
Salt or acid would likely do horrible things to flavor.
I usually just puree the Jamun and freeze it. No need to add anything else. It stays good for 4-6 months in freezer
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83842 | Can I use sourdough starter (kvasek) to produce kefir?
Is the yeast/bacteria balance in mature sourdough starter (fed on wheat and barley) correct for making kefir? If not, why?
No, you cannot. Kefir grains are a unique Symbiotic Culture of Bacteria and Yeast (SCOBY). Kefir grains are a gelatinous mass of microorganisms including Lactobacilli, Leuconostic, Acetobacter, and Saccharomyces. By looks, it is more like Ginger Beer Plant than sourdough starter.
It is not possible to create kefir grains from scratch. You will have to buy a starter, or get a donation from someone you know.
Or from someone you don't know. There are forums online to coordinate getting kefir grains. That's how I got mine.
I did some further reading and found that the active part of a sourdough starter is indeed a SCOBY but not of the same microbiology as kefir grains. Nevertheless, I will try adding to milk, or perhaps separate a portion of the starter and retrain it by gradually increasing the ratio of milk. I don't know what will happen
All the species/genera you’ve mentioned in your answer can be (/frequently are) represented in a sourdough starter.
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43286 | Will using 4 year old unsalted butter make one sick?
I just made twice baked potatoes - and started by adding 3 tsps. of unsalted butter to the meat of 5 large baking potatoes. After adding the butter and starting to mash some of the potatoes, I did a taste test - tasted kind of "off". I then thought to look at the expiration date on the butter - 4 years ago!!! I finished the assembly with regular fresh butter sour cream, etc. and the potatoes taste fine.
Question: will eating these make my family sick? Should I throw them out and start all over?
You have to ask yourself, do you feel lucky? Huh? Well do you? Seriously how much is not risking food born illness worth? The cost of the potatoes and sour cream cannot be very much. How much risk are you willing to undertake to avoid their loss?
I take it the butter was in the fridge, not the freezer?
Butter in freezer lasts forever
Did it not smell rancid? Butter lasts a long time, sure, but after 4 years I have to assume it smells like bad meat...
possible duplicate of Is it safe to eat butter after it has crossed its expiration date? Does butter ever soil in fridge?
There's no 100% answer to that question, we cannot say certainly whether they will make people ill, however there's not a single person on this site who will recommend that you eat it, which is a good indication. Even if you are lucky enough that there aren't harmful pathogens in the butter it will taste awful, which is another good reason to chuck it and start over.
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45910 | What is this really tasty part of a chicken found in a cavity in the hip?
About once per month, my mother prepares chicken with rice and a currysauce with pineapple. I don't know exactly what the method of preparation is of the chicken because it's prepared by one of those traveling grilling trucks.
However, what I do know is that there is a small (like 2 cm wide and half a cm deep) cavity in one of the hips of the chicken that's filled with really tasty meat. The cavity is open on the inside and I think it's the best part of the chicken. It appears to be some kind of organ meat, but I'm not sure what exactly it is. I also don't have a picture of the meat, sorry.
What could this meat be?
See also http://cooking.stackexchange.com/questions/30443/mystery-organ-on-the-underside-of-chicken-thighs/30452#30452
Traveling what now? Oh man. I want to go to there.
If you mean nearly black brown slightly spongy pieces, IIRC they are lungs.
Those are the chicken oysters -- muscle meat, not organ meat. I'm glad you've learnt to enjoy them by intuition, as they are indeed a prized portion of the chicken.
Wikipedia tells me the French call this portion sot-l'y-laisse: "(only) a fool leaves it there", because it is little known, easily missed, and much prized.
The French wiki article is actually really unclear: it mentions two definitions (depending on the dictionary), and is a little vague about what they are. This article cited as a source clarifies: one possible definition is indeed the oysters (which a "fool" could accidentally miss), and one is the tail section (which a "fool" could mistakenly discard as inedible). After discussing usage in the 18th century, it actually concludes that it must be the tail section, because the term is singular.
On the other hand, Wikipedia editors have decided that the English article about chicken oysters and the French one about sot-l'y-laisse are referring to the same thing, while also referring to them as huîtres de poulet (literally chicken oysters). I'm not sure what the modern usage in France is. (My very helpful wife is from Quebec.)
Most experts say this small part of the chicken is actually kidney, since it taste a lot like liver, not meat as in any other muscle on the chicken. It also is not attached by any tendons as a muscle would be.
Source for "most experts"?
Your answer could be improved with additional supporting information. Please [edit] to add further details, such as citations or documentation, so that others can confirm that your answer is correct. You can find more information on how to write good answers in the help center.
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45073 | How to safely reuse scissors used to open food packaging multiple days in a row?
I often have to resort to prepared food from the local supermarket for a number of consecutive days because my parents are on vacation. This food is sealed in vacuum bags and usually requires 3-5 minutes in the microwave depending on the type of food. The bags need to opened using scissors after they have been heated.
Because of the limited amount of scissors in the house, I often need to resort to reusing one or more scissors for 2 or more days in a row. What precautions should I take to avoid food poisoning?
Wash scissors after each use ...
Oh my. Do you have one of those toothbrush sterilizer things? If not, you need one. Get a second one for your kitchen shears.
I highly recommend 'come apart' kitchen shears -- you open them far enough (about 90 degrees from closed), and the two parts can seperate for easy cleaning.
Wash the scissors in hot soapy water after you've used them.
just so I understand you properly: do I need to do this after I opened each bag, or can I do this after I opened all the bags?
If the food is all cooked you should be fine to open all the bags with the same pair of scissors then wash them afterwards. You don't use a separate knife and fork for every item on the plate, after all :)
And if they're not specifically kitchen shears, make sure to dry them immediately. (as they might not be made from stainless steel)
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45514 | Milk substitute for ice cream and others
I'm thinking of reducing my dairy intake. For ice cream, I'm thinking of using a milk substitute and wondering what works well.
I'm thinking of:
starch sources for a "roux" like concoction:
potato: flour / starch
rice flour / starch
corn starch
chuffa
Possible thickener / emulsifier (to add in very small quantities)
-konjac
fats:
canola oil
coconut oil
I can currently make ice cream with just milk (no cream) by adding another fat (canola oil or coconut oil) but milk has those magical micelle fat globules. In freezing it might not make such a big difference (since things might separate slower in the solid state). What have others tried and what works in terms of flavor?
"ice cream with just milk" Isn't that called Gelato?
I add coconut oil and or canola oil, is that part of Gelato? I do this because otherwise I have to get heavy cream... and that's a pain.
Ciao Bella has an excellent 'coconut sorbet', that had the creamy quality of ice cream, without any actual dairy.
They released a cookbook a few years ago, and although I don't have it, I did browse through it in a store ... I don't remember the whole recipe, but I recall there being actual coconut meat in it, not just coconut milk. I don't remember there being any other starches or thickeners in it.
Had some coconut milk ice cream this weekend, tasted pretty good. I am sure there are plenty of recipes online; here is one I found just typing coconut milk ice cream recipes. There were a few others that looked interesting as well. One suggested adding toasted almonds and some dark chocolate shavings for an Almond Joy flavor :)
If you're going for low-fat but still creamy then tapioca starch works very well. I use it for sorbet, so it should work fine with milk substitutes as well.
Use about 1 tablespoon of starch per quart of liquid. Add another two teaspoons if you have no fat whatsoever. Make a slurry, cook to a low boil until thickened, etc. etc.
I'm not necessarily going for "low fat". It's mainly I've heard the fats and proteins in milk aren't that great in terms of health.
I was looking online and someone made oat milk without doing any cooking. So I did something like that 1 cup oats (ground to flour). This is probably too much especially since I also used coconut flour (mainly for flavor). It isn't "right" yet, but I think with the right ratios I might be able to do this w/o any cooking. Probably I need to use a blender to mix things properly before I put it in the ice cream machine.
I'll try more experiments with less oat flour, and maybe a little almond flour, and more oil and see how things come out.
I am fairly sure this will work. What matters in ice cream is not so much the emulsion, as the ratio of solids to water. Once everything is dispersed finely enough (and in a roux, it is), it should work well. There are ice creams which use starch too, for example gelato. You'll have to boil your sauce though, a simple slurry is likely to have an unpleasant off taste.
If you are making fruit ice cream, you might cook the roux with juice instead of water, for added taste, provided you like your fruit's taste when cooked.
Another option would be to use nut milks. I've read ice cream recipes with these, but never tried.
Take this advice with a grain of salt - I haven't tried it myself. And you won't get the exactly same taste and texture as with real dairy milk or cream, but this is normal for all substitutions. I still think that the result will be scoopable and tasty.
If I get try it, I'll post results.
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44659 | Does anyone cook/eat bladders?
There's a few places in the world that really don't waste any part of an animal when it comes to cooking, but I've yet to see any form of cooked bladders.
Is it an item that is cooked -or- eaten anywhere in the world?
I think I remember seeing somewhere that it's used as a "package" for stuffing, similar to how stomach is used for haggis. Can't point to the cuisine though.
Haggis can also be made with the bladder. Like all "poor" food, it's more about the technique than it is about the specific recipe. The bladder obviously requires more cleaning than the stomach because of the strong smell associated with it, but any natural pouch can be used.
Yes. Here's a specific example. Asian cuisine also has a strong tradition of using a wide variety of organ meats, many of which are considered delicacies.
The bladder would be a particularly tough piece of protein to prepare, but you can make just about anything palatable with proper cleaning and a long braise.
I don't actually see any culinary examples on the Wikipedia page, and the specific example isn't really about cooking/eating the bladders but rather using them as a vessel, from which the portion intended for eating is subsequently removed. So it's not even like a sausage casing - it's "cooked" in more or less the same way that aluminum foil is "cooked" when used for braising. Based on the pictures in your first link, the bladders themselves look quite inedible.
@Aaronut Very true; there may be a specific culinary or non-english term for bladder which I'm not finding. However, the bladder has demonstrable culinary use, and there are specific examples of similarly tough cuts like stomach being used. I personally have had (and greatly enjoyed!) dishes with tripe and tendon, which take a lot of cooking and still remain quite chewy. I think the hardest part of preparing the bladder would be cleaning, which is quite challenging with other cuts like stomach.
I don’t know how they use it, but I live in the Czech Republic (I’m American) and they sell chicken bladder here.
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100403 | What happens if I forget to feed my sourdough starter?
Is there something wrong that can happen if I forget to feed my sourdough starter? I kinda forgot to do it twice, but it still appears to have a few bubbles in it. Previously it contained hooch, which I discarded. Also, my starter has a dense consistency because the whole grain flour I guess.
So how should I feed it? I am using 5 tbsp of flour and 4 tbsp of tap water (previously rested for an hour or more to let the chlorine to fall to the bottom)
Can you clarify how old your starter is and how often you have been feeding it?
5/6 days old now i forgot to feed it 2 days ago
Then feed it again
In my experience, any issues with sourdough, up to and including a surface layer of fungus, formaldehyde smell, and rotten dirty socks smell, can be fixed by simply feeding it. The worse the sourdough's condition is, the longer you have to feed it; if you don't have any of the above mentioned issues, two days consistent feeding should be fine.
Three notes:
Usually I put in 2:1 volumetric flour to water.
I have used whole grain wheat (and rye) before, with no difficulties. The consistency will be a bit different, but whole grains can sustain a good long term sourdough. In my experience, a sourdough "trained" exclusively on whole grains does a much better job on any bread recipe with bran in it; whether whole grain or added.
If you are forgetful about a sourdough, consider putting it in the fridge. I put mine in the fridge and feed it once a week. You can miss a couple weeks, which will then cause the aforementioned smells, but it can be recovered in a few days of consistent feeding on the countertop.
and what do you mean with consistent feeding? no fungus has been find, smells like sour i dont know what its formaldehyde smell. previously it had hooch because i was adding the same volume of water and flour i think so.
@MichaelBenDavid Consistent feeding would be every day on the counter, or every week in the fridge.
ok got it......
Simple. Cut feed back to half of total weight (minus container weight). Add double flour to feed and same amount of water as cut back feed weight + 100 ml (approx).
Mix till combined and so on for 2/3 days. It will recover.
fridge for few hours between feeds.
Have been working with sours for long time, experienced baker, they are so unstable but bulletproof if treated right.
Pour out 1 cup (or about 1/3 of the total amount if you don't have 1 cup) and feed with 2 parts unbleached all-purpose flour to 1 part water. I keep my sourdough in a quart canning jar in the fridge. Once a week, I set it out until it reaches room temperature, set aside 1 cup for bread, feed it with 1/2 cup unbleached all-purpose flour and 1/4 cup filtered water, leave it out overnight, then put it back in the fridge the next day unless I'm making something else with sourdough. I always leave sourdough out overnight after feeding it.
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36336 | Difference between Rajasthani "sev tamatar nu shak" and Gujrati "sev tamatar nu shak"
What is the difference between Rajasthani "sev tamatar nu shak" and Gujrati "sev tamatar nu shak". Do they use different spices or ingredients or method of cooking?
Rajasthani is typically spicier (red and green chillies), and/or sour with green tomatoes
Gujarati is typically sweeter (Look for jaggery in recipe)
Otherwise it's a very generic Indian reciepe
hmmm there is no onion in either of them I think
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21650 | How to poach an egg without vinegar?
What is the best way to poach an egg without vinegar? Is there a quick and easy alternative?
Heston Blumenthal has brought his unique scientific approach to bear on this recently. The main pointers for a perfect poached egg are as follows:
The egg must be fresh. A fresh egg has a thicker, more gel-like albumen. As it gets older, this becomes watery, and so just disperses throughout the water when you add it. To test if your egg is fresh, place it in a jug of cold water. If it floats, it's not fresh - the egg has had time to absorb air through its shell. A fresh egg sinks and stays sunk.
The water temperature should be 80ºC/176ºF exactly. You can measure this with a sugar or probe thermometer. The egg should be at room temperature.
The egg should not come into contact with direct heat, so put a plate or small bowl on the bottom of the pan, bottom up.
Once the water (in a medium to large saucepan) is up to temperature, carefully add the fresh egg and cook for 4 minutes exactly (for a large egg of the domestic chicken, Gallus gallus domesticus). Drain and serve - the white should be set but not rubbery (a drawback of using vinegar) and the yolk should be creamy and rich.
+1 You are like the Brad Pitt character in Inglorious Basterds. Firm, and commanding.
You probably heard we ain't in the egg-wastin' business; we in the poachin' egg business. And cousin, business is a-boomin'. :)
If you're going to specify exact values for temperature and time, you (or Heston) should probably also specify egg size. One would expect that if exactly 4 minutes works for a standard 'large' egg, a 'jumbo' egg might take take 4 min. 15 sec. And to make this scientific, other variables such as barometric pressure, volume of water, and species of egg should be specified.
Updated to be more specific. I'll let you do the science on barometric pressure :)
+1 - Curiously, the more sturdy albumen in a fresh egg is actually a downside for certain dishes, like quiche and custard, or any other dish made with a milk and egg royale. The ropy chalaza that holds things together when poaching is a hassle when custarding. Just find that interesting.
Indeed. It's a good thing for meringue, however.
Just simmer water, and poach the egg. The vinegar is simply there to help coagulate the white. I never use vinegar for poaching eggs. You just have to try to be as careful as possible when setting the egg into the water. have the water at a bare simmer, not a rolling boil. These things will help to keep the white intact.
Using very fresh eggs will also help keep the white from spreading.
This method may not be practical if you want a lot of poached eggs but this is what I do.
wait for the water to come to the boil
turn down heat somewhat
use a spoon to stir the water until a visible vortex forms in the middle of the pot
gently pour in the egg in the vortex
wait until done
this works brilliantly, I would underline not to be tempted to stir the water at all once the egg is in though, (it screws up the flow of the water, and hence also the egg).
What I generally do is use a slotted spoon to drain the runny parts of the white of, before putting it into the water. This goes well with the aforementioned method from Heston Blumenthal.
In addition to simmering water, fresh eggs, salt and vinegar, and getting rid of the outer egg white with a slotted spoon or mash, there is a way to use older eggs.
You first boil them for 90 sec in their shell, and afterwards break them in the liquid for poaching. This sets the outer eggwhite somewhat, and keeps it together. I have had mixed results with this, but give it a try if you have older eggs
personally I use lemon, it helps to acidate the water and adds a unexpected flavour to the poached eggs, its wonderful when making eggs benedict.
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77656 | Can I substitute gluten for eggs in coconut flour pancake recipes?
I'm looking to reduce carbs, yet still have things like pancakes, waffles, and maybe even tortillas.
I've tried several coconut flour pancake recipes, but they all come out tasting like fried eggs to me.
I was thinking I could probably add vital wheat gluten in place of the eggs, but I'm not certain this would work. What amount of it to use per egg in the recipe?
ground flaxseed and water is a more common egg substitution.
Granted, but for a different reason. fFlaxseed provides binding but does not provide the structures of the gluten proteins.
The primary reason coconut flour recipes (especially a high hydration recipe like pancakes) end up tasting like eggs is because they are primarily eggs with very little flour.
Coconut flour is extremely absorbent, which means two things:
For the same amount of liquid, you need less coconut flour compared to other flours like flaxseed meal, almond flour, etc. Because you must use less of it, there is less flour "flavor" that comes through to the final product, if that makes sense.
For the same amount of coconut flour compared to other flours, you need more liquid. Because coconut flour has very little protein compared to other flours, that liquid tends to be eggs, which have the necessary protein to provide structure.
Take a muffin recipe for example (I've omitted all other ingredients besides flour and eggs for sake of clarity).
Flaxseed meal version:
¼ cup flaxseed meal (28 g)
1 jumbo egg (63 g)
Coconut flour version:
2 Tbsp coconut flour (14 g)
1 ½ jumbo eggs (95 g)
Now let's look at the baker's percentages of eggs to flour in both of these recipes. In the flaxseed meal version, we see that the weight of the egg is 225% compared to the flour (if the flour were considered 100%). In the coconut flour version, the weight of the eggs are 642% compared to the flour.
Something that uses 642% eggs is likely going to taste a lot like eggs. But wait, we're not done yet. Most pancakes recipes are simply flat griddle-cooked muffins, though they tend to have even more liquid than regular muffins. That likely means even more eggs, and egg ratios upwards of 800-900%. At those levels, it's more like an omelette with the coconut flour just going along for the ride.
Whether you can substitute vital wheat gluten (VWG) in place of eggs is really going to depend on the rest of the recipe. Without knowing what the other ingredients are, it's hard to make suggestions. If eggs are the only ingredient providing moisture, then substituting with VWG alone won't work without also adding a source of moisture. My gut feeling is that VWG would tend to exacerbate the requirement for moisture (it's also very thirsty), and tend to make leathery pancakes. Actually, I suppose it might theoretically be possible to replace the function of an egg by combining a small amount of vital wheat gluten (say, 6 g) with a non-egg source of liquid like buttermilk (say, 45 g). I'll have to try experimenting with that and report back. Until then, this is how I approached solving the "eggyness" problem:
EDIT: since posting this, I've developed a coconut-flour version of my low-carb Buttermilk Pancakes #12 recipe, which I'll include here. While I know this isn't a recipe exchange site, I think this recipe can help show how I approached solving the OP's original problem of too much "eggyness":
Buttermilk Pancakes #12 (Coconut Flour + Whey Protein Isolate)
3 ½ Tbsp coconut flour (*flour*) 42.98% 24.5 g
1 Tbsp psyllium husk powder (*flour*) 14.91% 8.5 g
¼ cup, packed, unflavored whey protein isolate (*flour*) 42.11% 24.0 g
¼ tsp baking powder 2.02% 1.2 g
1/16 tsp baking soda 0.51% 0.3 g
1 Tbsp Splenda (non-nutritive sweetener) 2.96% 1.7 g
3/8 tsp Kosher salt 1.84% 1.0 g
1 jumbo egg 110.53% 63.0 g
1 cup buttermilk 429.82% 245.0 g
1 Tbsp unsalted butter 24.86% 14.2 g
A couple of things I'll note. First, this recipe has around 475% hydration, so it's still quite high, but it solves the eggyness problem by using only 1 egg. To make up for the structure and liquid that the egg would normally provide, I replaced it with several ingredients which work together to function like an egg. First is the unflavored whey protein powder. When mixed with the buttermilk and cooked, it will set up similar to how an egg might set up. However, being a pure protein powder, it is an extreme "drier" (similar to egg whites), and would produce an inedible dense pancake by itself. To balance that out, I added a moisture retainer in the form of ground psyllium husk. The psyllium husk also acts like a binder and holds everything together similar to how an egg might. The end result is probably the equivalent to around 3 eggs or so without tasting like an egg.
P.S. I originally posted this recipe along with 3 other low-carb flour variations over on reddit.
Regarding the carbs in buttermilk (and yogurt): While the nutrition info for 1 cup (245 g) of buttermilk and 1 cup (245 g) of whole plain (unsweetened) yogurt will say around 12 g of carbs from sugars, in reality, that number is actually much lower. The reason for this is that most of the milk sugar (lactose) in buttermilk and yogurt has been converted by the bacteria culture to lactic acid. As doctors Jack Goldberg and Karen O'Mara explain in their book "The GO-Diet", you can count a cup of either of these as 4 g of net carbs rather than 12 g. (See this website for more info: http://www.lowcarbluxury.com/yogurt.html).
I don't think that will work well but I can't explain why. I do think egg whites or possibly gelatin would work better. Neither has much flavor, and both have similar consistency. Coconut flour needs LOTS of moisture as well as binding properties. You might try half whole eggs and half egg whites OR half whole eggs and half softened gelatin by volume.
Gluten will give you a bread-like texture; while it is a protein with a lot of binding power it doesn't "stick" to much else than itself once it is developed. This is evident from what happens when you bake a basic bread (no eggs or egg alternatives) vs a cake.
Legume flours - like chickpea flour (indian besan), soybean flour, lentil flours - are easy to use and effective binders, though they tend to give slightly idiosyncratic textures.
Factory-made egg replacers could work.
There are a few more egg replacers that are known effective (and probably closer in texture) but more difficult to make and use, eg flaxseed gel or aquafaba.
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89396 | What can I substitute for radish when making kimchi?
I want to try the recipe but could not get radish.
Kimchi doesn't necessarily require radish. Why not just leave it out?
Yes.... what are you looking for in a substitute? Do you eat the radish, normally? The radish greatly enhances and accelerates the "souring" of the kimchee. In that regard, I don't think there's anything that really works as a substitute. However, you can make a perfectly fine kimchee without it, it's just a little bit different.
Jicama. It has the same kind of crunch and taste is also subtle.
A substitute used in kimchi must also be safe to ferment in that process. Is your recommended substitute?
There is pickled jicama, so should be fine as kimchi.
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90995 | What is the difference between a guajillo and a cayenne pepper?
They look the same to me but I can't find literature on how they are different.
The Guajillo is a dried Mirasol chili. The Mirasol is in the same family as the Cayenne (Capsicum annuum), but with 2,500-5,000 Scovilles compared to Cayenne's 30,000 - 50,000 Scovilles, it has significantly less heat.
Do you know if how different they are for medicinal purposes? There is a remedy that calls for cayenne and I have a guajillo plant outside.
I followed your lead on scovilles and found that capsaicin is what makes a pepper healthy but its also what makes it spicy so I guess that answers the question
I don't know of any medicinal properties of either, but if it stems from capsaicin, greater scovilles = more capsaicin. To accept this as the answer to your question, you can click the green checkmark.
I don't feel like creating a new answer but you should note that even though they are in the same family, the two peppers are not similar at all. Guajillos are sweet and larger and used to make rich pepper sauces. Cayennes are used only to make things spicy. They are too small and way too spicy to be used for pepper flavor or as bulk in a sauce.
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81678 | Sous vide the same meat on two days
I plan to sous vide lamb chops, which is going to take 3 hours. Since I have to work, it will be too late for dinner if I start cooking after work. Can I sous vide it for 2 hours the night before, put it in the fridge, and continue cooking for another hour the following day? Do I need more time on the following day as the temperature of the meat is lowered in the fridge?
No, you will need to cook it for the proper length of time all at once.
Sous Vide heats the food very slowly and depending on the density and thickness of the food, it can take quite a while for the center to come up to the finish temperature. Additionally, this temperature is usually lower than the temperature applied in other methods of cooking so it kills bacteria and parasites more slowly than high-temp cooking.
For proteins, an extended cook time is needed to get the center up to temp. Additionally, because the temp is lower, more time is needed at that temp to kill off any bacteria or parasites.
By not heating for the entire time at once, you risk never bringing the center up to temperature! It might be undercooked or worse, it might be dangerous.
Note: Some fatty proteins are cooked at a higher temperature for longer periods of time to also break down collagen and connective tissue. Not cooking them all-at-once will similarly not have the desired effect on the collagen and connective tissue.
Another Note: Some might wonder how anyone ever cooked and served a rare roast beef in the past if a long exposure to lower temp is needed to make the roast safe in the center. The answer is that contamination of beef with parasites is not common and even though beef does contain bacteria, the bacteria exists near the surface of the meat. The density of the meat makes it difficult for the bacteria to spread to the interior parts. This keeps the center perfectly safe to eat raw if you could somehow cut off the surface without inadvertently contaminating the center with bacteria from the knife.
SOLUTION
One solution is to cook the protein completely on a day when you do have the time. You can leave the lamb chop still in the vacuum bag in the fridge for a day-or-two and then drop it back into the water bath at the same temp on the day that you want to serve it. Because you have already killed all the bad stuff and it has remained sealed, all you need to do is get the center up to temp and it will be ready for the final searing step or serving.
That solution is not perfect however. Empirically I have observed that when using this method some meats will dry out quickly on your plate after slicing. It must be something with the proteins or cell structure so that it releases all of its water quickly after being sliced. I've mostly experienced this with leaner meats like beef chuck steaks. I haven't tried it on lamb chops, but they are similar in leanness to a chuck steak.
Thank you for your quick answer! Will definitely try it out : )
Sous vide lamb chop should only take you about 1hour and 30 minutes @ 131F (55C). This will result in a medium rare chop. Given your 2 hour time window, I would cook for the 1.5 hours, then chill in ice bath and refrigerate. You could even freeze at this point. Anyway, re-therm when you want to eat. It will take about an hour - 1.5 hours. I would reheat a couple of degrees below your cooking temperature so as not to overcook.
Thank you! Somehow the recipe I read says 3 hrs. When you say medium rare should only takes 1 hr 30 mins, does it matter how much I'm cooking? That's something I don't get too. Usually the recipe would mention how much meat and the ingredients. Do I need to adjust the temperature and time if I cook more?
@Ada No. You don't alter time or temp based on total amount. However, you do need to alter time (not temp) based on thickness...say if you have a double thick chop. That will take longer. You also want a vessel large enough to allow for water circulation. If you pack it too full, you will not have good circulation and the temperature will not be consistent throughout. For more info Google "Douglas Baldwin sous vide cooking". He has worked all of this out.
End up my lamb chop needs more than 1 hr 30 mins since it's kind of thick, but I do get lots of good info from Douglas Baldwin website. Thanks a lot!
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77268 | Can I make a hollandaise sauce from mix the day before?
I would like to make a hollandaise sauce from a McCormick mix a day ahead. Will I be able to reheat it and is it safe?
Safe under which storage conditions?
I don't think it will work... at least reliably work.
Point of reference: I once worked in a restaurant under a frugal French Chef (I know, a redundant term). The only thing that was always thrown out at the end of the night was the Hollandaise, no matter how much was left.
Hollandaise is a delicate chemistry of proteins, fats, carefully applied heat and whisking. Surviving the create with heat, cool down/store, reheat cycle is a long shot. ..and, as you suggest, there may be safety issues.
Of course the restaurant made Hollandaise from scratch. But I doubt package mix is much more robust. Note these ingredients on McCormick mix:
Those egg solids are going to be delicate, and maybe unpredictable. The lecithin may also bring surprises. The citric acid may also cause issues in storage--maybe breaking protein/fat bonds.
Or, I could be wrong. Maybe the high amount of starch will make the sauce robust. Example: you don't hear of many fruit pie fillings breaking overnight.
I'd spend the money and do a trial run to know for sure.
End Note: Consider Knorr brand Hollandaise mix. I never used McCormick, but I have used Knorr and liked it.
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101113 | How do I make a pancake without egg?
I'm trying to make a basic pancake, with traditional texture, fluff, and taste, but without using eggs. Is this possible?
What kind of pancakes are you thinking of? Swedish, korean, american, french, or..?
French and American
There are multiple recipes for eggless pancakes online. Most increase the amount of baking powder to help with the rise. Many use milk and butter, so they are not vegan. If you are looking for a vegan recipe, those exist too. They also tend to increase the baking powder, and often include non-dairy milk. Whether or not they will sufficiently mimic the fluffiness of a traditional recipe is going to be completely up to you.
Thanks! I'm actually fine with dairy products, so the non-vegan version is fine for me
Upon searching different websites, I found these options as the best egg-substitute (usually I use the forth option at home).
Applesauce
Use a quarter cup of unsweetened applesauce in place of one egg in most baking recipes. Some sources say to mix it with half a teaspoon of baking powder. If all you have is sweetened applesauce, then simply reduce the amount of sugar in the recipe. Applesauce is also a popular healthy replacement for oil in many baked goods.
Banana
Use a quarter cup of mashed banana (from about half a banana) instead of one egg when baking. Note that this may impart a mild banana flavor to whatever you are cooking, which could be a good thing.
Flaxseeds
Heart-healthy flaxseeds can be used as an egg substitute. Mix one tablespoon of ground flaxseeds with three tablespoons of water until fully absorbed and viscous. Use in place of one egg. (You can use pre-ground flaxseeds or grind them yourself in a spice or coffee grinder.)
Water, oil, and Baking Powder
Whisk together 2 tbspns water, 1 tspn oil (vegetable or corn oil), and 2 tspns baking powder. Use this in place of 1 egg.
You can review the (source website).
I make (U.S.) pancakes often. I rarely use an egg. I use plain yogurt which I think gets more fluff out of the baking powder because it is sour.
Try
1.5 cups white flour
0.5 cup wheat flour
1 tbsp. baking powder
1 cup plain yogurt. Not low fat! Fatful yogurt.
Honey, approx. 2 tbsp.
Oil (I am using sunflower lately) approx. 1 tbsp.
Milk (whatever I have) to thin to pourable
No oil in the pan.
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68611 | What is the name of this Chinese Fish Soup where guests cook their own fish in broth?
One of my friends tells about some kind of a delicious fish soup that he ate in china. But he doesn't know the name of the dish.
It was served in a big bowl in the center of the table (in a restaurant). The bowl is heating, and it's a soup that does not contain any fish. Some pieces of fresh cleaned fish are in front of each person, so he can put it in the soup, and after a minute, the fish is ready to be eaten.
Do you know the name of this food?
Sounds like hot pot.
There are a zillion variations, with different kinds of broths and different things to cook in it, so I don't think there's any one recipe name you could search for to duplicate exactly what your friend had. It's possible that knowing the region he was in would allow some informed guesses from folks with some local knowledge (not me). Note that it's common to cook a lot of different things in the broth all at the same time, not just one thing per meal.
So if you want to try to make something similar without a lot of work, I suspect you'd just want to a broth you like (or a soup base from a Chinese grocery store - hot pot is popular!) and whatever simple fish sounds good to you. If you want more elaborate things, try Google; there's too much variety for us to try to cover it here.
I was thinking this, too but the OP's focus on fish confused me.
@Catija Yeah, it's odd, but it's hard to imagine the shared broth in the middle of the table being something else. My guess is the restaurant offered all kinds of things for hot pot and they only got one, or the OP's friend just neglected to mention other things.
Here's a good video of hot pot https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EzOxAeqoCso made me hungry
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68586 | How to have my solar system stick that would be edible
I am doing a solar system project in my science bell. I have the choice to make edible food. So I wanted to make cookies for the solar system. Here's the problem, I can get all the colors I need with my parents, but I need to find out how to make it stick without using glue, or icing. How do I make it edible to eat afterwards. My project is due on May, 10th 2016 and any response before that would be great.
Can you give us some more details on how you're building it? Will the pieces hang on a mobile? Be mounted to a poster? On pegs in a diorama? And why specifically can't you use icing? Royal icing is the default "bakery glue" that usually holds together things like gingerbread houses, but with some more info I could suggest an alternative.
It's really easier to do with icing, but if you make a really pale dough such as a sugar cookie dough, you can color it.
I once made pie-chart shaped cookies by doing this, then making wedges in various colors & sizes, then squishing them all back together into a log, and slicing it into rounds. I don't know if it was the colors that I was using, but I found that they lightened up a bit as the cookies baked, so you'll want to make the dough darker/deeper than desired.
The trick is in getting the mottled look of some of the planets -- what you want to do it color two or three chunks in the different colors found on the planet, and once they're each well blended, break them into little bits, then toss them together before squishing it all back into a single ball (or sheet). You might want to be a little more specific in your squishing things back together with the earth, if you want to do the continents + oceans ... but you can cheat and do blue & white (oceans + clouds) so you don't have to be as precise.
If you wanted to do it in icing, you can get the mottled look by loading two colors in the bag, so you get a little of each color with each squeeze. A star tip will help to make each less distinctive. You can see the effect at:
http://geeked.gsfc.nasa.gov/?p=5355 (scroll down 'til you see the orange bits)
https://www.flickr.com/photos/gsfc/4311777957 (top right one; waited 'til it crusted up a bit before I smoothed it down)
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16014 | Where can I bulk-buy cheap parmesan?
My friend planted three rows of basil in his garden to make pesto, and now we need to source roughly 25-50lbs of parmesan. With that kind of quantity, cheaper is better.
The price of genuine-sealed-and-certified parmagiano reggiano is quite high and fairly consistent, especially for more aged varieties. I think your best bet to save money will be to use a similar parmagiano reggiano cousin, such as grana padano, romano, or a quality Argentinian reggianito. As a second-tier approach, you might look at domestic Parmesan, but use caution as it may not have the same quality as a one of the Italian imports.
As for genuine Parmesan: you're buying at least a couple hundred dollars of cheese, and this gives you some bargaining power. Buy or ask to taste a small sample of whatever you're considering, and try to negotiate; managers may be willing to offer you a bulk discount. I'd gather a couple quotes from cheese shops, try prices at your local Costco/Sam's Club, and talk to the upscale grocery stores in your area.
As far as pricing goes, I've seen genuine-seal-and-everything Parmagiano Reggiano on sale at about $12-13/lbs at my local Southern Season. I generally expect to pay $18-22/lbs at upscale grocery stores for Parmesan, with remarkably little variation between stores. Your standard grocery stores tend to sell small blocks of inferior-quality and freshness Parmesan for similar prices.
In contrast, grana padano runs around $12-13/lbs on average at my local Trader Joe's, and might be available for under $10/lbs with a good sale. I usually buy blocks of that for general cooking use, as it is close enough in taste and much cheaper.
I would also add that Pecorino Romano is usually cheaper than Parmigiano Reggiano and is traditionally included in pesto along with it (the traditional cheese is actually Fiore Sardo, which is also made with sheep milk, but that is very difficult to find outside of Italy).
It should be noted that although domestic (i.e., US-made) paremsan-style cheese can be much cheaper than the "real" stuff, a recent Cooks Illustrated taste test concluded that real Parmigiano-Reggiano is far superior. A panel of blind taste testers could easily pick out the real cheese; the domestic versions had very different textures and were described as "rubbery, salty, and bland."
@ESultanik: That cook's illustrated taste test isn't by any means comprehensive, given the variety of cheese producers. A high-quality domestic may be acceptable for this use, although I'd much sooner use grana padano. I think you'd have to compare a couple, and stay away from the cheap grocery store "grated Parmesan." (I use quotes, because the connection between that and real reggiano is tenuous at best).
@BobMcGee: True, they did only compare cheeses from six different domestic producers.
Updated Cook's Illustrated Taste Test article.
Costco has good quality, large chunks of parmesan for a lot cheaper than grocery stores.
I can't find a quote anywhere on their site. What's the price like at your local Costco?
It's been a long time since I had to buy a chunk, but I think it's somewhere in the 9-10 dollars/pound range. For comparison my local supermarket price is around 16 dollars/pound.
True. Costco is generally good value when it comes to cheese..
Well, it's not first frost yet in most areas, so you might still have time on this --
I'd ask your local Italian restaurants where they get their cheese from. Odds are, they're not paying the grocery store $15-20/lb prices.
In my area, there's Restaurant Depot, which sells Parmagiano Reggiano cheaper than some of the regular grocery stores sell other cheaper varieties. The thing is, they sell it in chunks about 1/8 of a wheel or larger if I recall correctly (which is about 10lb a chunk ... maybe they had 5lb chunks, but I don't think it was smaller than that), and they'll only give membership cards to people who can prove they have a business or a non-profit ... but it's possible that a restaurant who already has a good source might be willing to resell some to you.
We find good values at our local ethnic market -- specifically, in my case, Phonecia Specialty Foods in Houston, TX. They have no problems selling in bulk by the wheel.
This is just plain silly! You can get grated domestic parmesan at ca 4.14/lb in bulk foods section of WINCO supermarkets. Plenty of flavor, particularly if making pesto
"US domestic parmesan" is like "US champagne" --- an oxymoron.
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24408 | Can meat and cheese be stored together?
My husband is constantly storing opened blocks of cheese in the same container as his summer sausage, also opened. He insists that they don't need to be separated and that I am being paranoid. I say he needs to dump his bachelor habits before we all get sick.
Who is right?
Are they refrigerated?
Summer sausage is cooked in the smoking process, and fermented, which kills bacteria and gives it a long fridge life. Some summer sausages don't even require refrigeration until opened! Wet, raw sausage, on the other hand, is asking for trouble.
I'm sure your husband will forgive your fussiness when you bring him kielbasa and a nice chunk of aged cheddar, open in the same container, and ready to munch!
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94183 | What is the benefit of Pressure Cooking (other than faster cooking)?
What are some of the benefits of a Pressure Cooker over a Slow Cooker (crock pot) besides that it's much faster, less nutrient loss (maybe) and less heat in the kitchen?
This may have the information you are looking for https://cooking.stackexchange.com/q/81997/35357
Very closely related to https://cooking.stackexchange.com/questions/93384/is-there-any-advantage-to-cooking-beans-in-a-pressure-cooker-besides-saving-tim/93385#comment147850_93385
Updated my question. Looking for benefits other than those from the answers cited.
The nutrient loss from any means of cooking is going to depend on whether you consume the cooking liquid or not. Pressure cooking is often used to boil before draining, unlike (my) slow cooking. This introduces an additional variable that's hard to control for
I do not know that there are any benefits aside from what you have already mentioned. Pressure cooking is a technique, like using the slow cooker. It is similar to a debate on broiling vs. pan-searing. They both do something similar in slightly different ways.
The only other (and totally subjective) advantage I have seen, since I primarily use the pressure cooker for stocks, is better gelatin extraction from the bones and tendons with the pressure cooker. My stocks are thicker than the old-school "simmer it all day" approach, but it may just be I'm getting better at making stock since I gave up using anything but a pressure cooker for stock years ago. Therefore my case series is a retrospective review and subject to inherent biases from the study methodology.
Pressure cooking preserves more nutrients, especially heat sensitive nutrients,it uses less heat and the heat is used more efficiently which is why you have a shorter cooking time.
Here is 1995 study:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7792260
Basically,
Boiling food had up to a 60% loss of nutrients. Roasting and steaming 10% - 50% loss in nutrients. Pressure cooking 5% - 10% loss in nutrients.
You are repeating the study linked in Wikipedia. That study 1) only measured 2 nutrients, provit. A and vit. C. 2) only measured 2 foods, spinach and amaranth. 3) It found that after 10 minutes of pressure cooking, there is more retention when compared to 30 minutes of frying. But if you fry for shorter times, or boil the food, there is more retention. So, you are making sweeping conclusions based on very narrow data, which are not even unequivocal.
And the key point of pressure cookers is raising the heat.
I would also classify pressure cooking as a form or boiling/steaming. It is simply done under pressure which permits it to be at a higher temp than "normal" water based cooking as @Stephie is implying. This tends to be an example of why allowing nutritional type discussions here is a very slippery slope. It lead to too many unsupportable or unsubstantiated claims and conflicting arguments. The claims in many cases may even be correct, but not studied and consistent enough to not be disputed. Higher nutrient retention may be true, at least for some nutrients, but such claims are disputed.
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20680 | Best way to rehydrate dry black beans so the skins are not hard but beans are soft?
I have a recipe for rehydrating red beans that says you should boil them briefly (2 min) then soak them overnight (6-8 hrs) to rehydrate them so that the skins aren't hard.
Is this advisable? Is there a better option?
Does it make any difference?
Does the recipe actually say the skins would be hard? Soaking beans (including the quick soak method you describe) is more about getting the inside of the beans soft, and reducing the subsequent cooking time.
Red beans or black beans? Title/content are different. (maybe it doesn't matter)
@Dhall -Good eye. Yes, I'm asking about BLACK beans, but the recipe is talking about RED beans. I figured "a bean is a bean" , but that's one reason I asked.
If you soak your beans in brine (3tbsp table salt per gallon of water, or 1.5% salt by weight) it'll help soften the skins by replacing calcium and magnesium ions in the skin. After soaking for 8–24 hours, drain and rinse. (Source: Cooks Illustrated, login required). Harold McGee in On Food and Cooking also mentions this (p. 488–489) and suggests 1% salt by weight. McGee also mentions that 0.5% baking soda will further reduce cooking times (but may lead to unpleasant taste & mouth feel).
Alternatively, Cook's Illustrated also reports that dried kombu can be used to similar effect, without needing the soak.
Even after brining, taste them when nearly done cooking: you may need to add some salt—it doesn't always penetrate that far into the beans. At least, that's been my experience.
Quick summary:
Create 1–1.5% salt (by weight) brine, approx 3tbsp table salt per gallon of water.
Sort (remove rocks, deformed and damaged beans, etc.) and rinse dried beans. Drain rinse water.
Soak rinsed beans in brine for 8–24 hours. Beans will noticeably swell.
Drain brine, rinse beans again.
Cook beans normally. Towards the end of cooking, season to taste.
You want to season towards the end of the cooking because it results in creamier texture and also eating some beans which haven't been heated to boiling for 10 minutes is ill-advised due to phytohaemagglutinin.
So you're saying that you put the salt in before you begin yoru 8-24h soak, right? I love Am. Test Kitchen (the show Cooks Illustrated is associated with) and have found their product advice exceptional and cost effective. So I'll give this a try.
@ClayNichols: Yes, you mix the salt and water (to form a brine) and then soak the dry beans in that. Definitely advisable to mix salt and water first, it takes some stirring to get it to dissolve. (After the soak is done, drain and rinse, then add plain water, and cook)
I’m shocked that the Cook’s Illustrated article you linked to stated that adding kombu eliminated the need for soaking altogether! I am excited and curious to experiment with this.
What you seem to be describing is the "quick soak" method, which does work fine, but in my experience, the beans are more likely to fall apart than they will with a long, cold soak.
My current preferred method is to sort and rinse a pound of dry beans, and then add them and 6-8 cups of water to a slow cooker set to low and let them cook all day. Though this does work best for things like chili and red beans & rice (basically situations where I don't care if the beans are falling apart by the time I'm eating them.
If I cared more about the beans' appearance, I would do an overnight soak in cold water, and then transfer them to my cooking vessel to cook until they're just tender, with no al dente beans in a few test spoonfuls.
I have never had a problem with bean skins being hard with any method.
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15753 | Undercooked beans in chili?
I made a bit of a mistake, being a lazy bachelor and inexperienced at cooking. I was making chili and when it came time to add beans I discovered I didn't have any canned beans. I did however have some dried beans. I decided to save time and add these directly to the pot of chili and add some water.
However, after much simmering the beans maintain a certain unpalatable crispness. I have also read that undercooked beans contain a chemical lectin which can cause stomach discomfort. I have also read that beans should be soaked, the water discarded to remove the lectin, and then boiled to cook them.
Is there any way to salvage this? Should I just continue cooking the chili for hours? Will I have to throw out my potentially delicious chili?
Not sure about the absolute safeness level - but, yes, you can get them all the way cooked by cooking longer. If you want the beans as soft as canned chili, that may mean a LOT longer (simmer 12-18 hours?)
That sounds like a solution. You might put it as an answer?
You might be able to reduce the total cooking time by soaking in the fridge overnight, then cooking.
@Jefromi I am doing that, think it might help.
Apparently, some people specify soak/rinse as an integral step to extract and discard toxins for some bean varietals, and that cooking alone is not enough (hence the initial link). But, I'm not knowledgeable in this area, and wanted to leave answering to those with that knowledge.
It looks to me like you have a couple of things going on here:
You are worried about the safety of undercooked beans
You want your beans to be palatable
To address the safety issue, I think we'd need to know more about the kind of beans you're using. Kidney beans are the ones most well known to be toxic if they are undercooked. Other beans, say, great northerns, or pintos, wouldn't have the same problem.
Then again, you still want a chili that is edible.
You certainly can cook dried beans, but there are a few factors getting in your way.
They do take a while. I cook beans fairly often in our house. Even after an overnight soak, they still often take (depending on the kind of bean) 2 1/2 hours at a low simmer.
Then you have the acid issue. Most chili is tomato-based, and even those that aren't usually have some other sort of acid. I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that yours does. Acid does inhibit the softening of beans, and this can work for you or against you. Many (non-texan) chili cooks find that the acid keeps the pre-cooked beans from turning to mush. On the other hand, the amount of tomatoes in most chilis means that you could boil for weeks, and those beans will probably remain hard.
Lastly, I'm guessing that you don't cook with dried beans too often. I don't mean that to be an insult--I've actually done the exact same thing as you, and found myself coping with a pot of chili full of hard beans that I owed to a football party. The reason that I bring this up is that, believe it or not, dried beans actually go stale. If they're old, they may never soften.
As I mentioned, I did have this same thing happen to a pot of my chili. If memory serves, I sat there fishing out each bean for probably longer than it was worth.
Going fishing is the best option, it will be tedious and time consuming but I'm guessing you used a stock Midwest recipe of tomatoes and beans
If you cook them long enough, they'll still soften up, you just might have to simmer them overnight or even into the next day.
Although I'll refrain from the obvious jokes, prolonged cooking also reduces one other common side effect of beans. I'm sure you can guess what the side effect is.
It all worked out after I simmered it for a much longer time than I originally planned. Soaking in the fridge overnight helped too.
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64751 | replace kosher pickle brine after leak
I made kosher dills for a Christmas gift and they turned out great. The jar tipped in transit and leaked all the brine. Can I refill it? With what?
Are they refrugerator pickles or properly canned?
I don't think they're either. As far as I understand refrigerator and/or canned pickles that is the process of boiling them and using vinegar. These are kosher dills which were made by allowing them to sit in a salt brine for over a week. The lactic fermentation made them sour and delicious. Since it's not vinegar, but fermented, I worry that there's no replacement liquid I can put them in.
For fermented pickles, I suggest using a salty brine similar to the one you started with.
If you are really lucky, enough lactobacillae are present to recreate a pickling brine, otherwise a 5% salt solution should help keeping the cucumbers for a bit longer.
Instruct the recipients to use the pickles rather quickly, I'd guestimate a week in the refrigerator should be ok.
Ok. Thanks for the suggestion! Might also suggest we just eat them immediately.
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30588 | What is the purpose of kosher salt in peanut butter? Can it be replaced with something else?
From here: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/homemade-peanut-butter-recipe/index.html
Ingredients
15 ounces shelled and skinned AB's roasted peanuts, recipe follows
**1 teaspoon kosher salt**
1 1/2 teaspoons honey
1 1/2 tablespoons peanut oil
What is the purpose of kosher salt in Peanut butter? Can it be
replaced with something else?
A simpler recipe is simply to grind peanuts (roasted or un-roasted) through a suitable grinder (fine meat grinder) and add some normal table salt if you think it needs it (it probably doesn't). Some shops here will grind your selection of fresh nuts at point of purchase, so you can mix and match them, sort of like kids at the soda fountain :-)
Alton Brown just generally prefers kosher salt, for reasons that don't really apply to peanut butter, which will be ground down anyway.
What matters is the total weight of salt. Remember, kosher salt tends to weight approximately 1/2 as much (depending on brand) as table salt, per unit of volume.
So you can replace the kosher salt with sea salt, or any locally available salt on a weight per weight basis. The absolute amount of salt to use is also completely a matter of taste and preference.
The purpose of the salt in peanut butter is only to enhance the flavor. It does not participate in any chemistry, and is not sufficiently concentrated to have any preservative effect.
Salt is there only for taste ?
Yes, it is far too little to be a preservative. It is only for flavor. The pb would taste quite flat and boring without it.
AH! I had once tasted the pb from market, and I found it to be extremely sweet! I started hating it since then!
Some pb may have more or less sugar or other sweetener added. In the US commercial brands it tends to be about 2% by weight. Controlling the sweetness level is an advantage of homemade.
Salt is salt if dissolved into a liquid or blended into a paste.
Kosher salt is just larger crystals, it tastes and works the same as any other salt. It is mostly called for because it has become "fashionable".
Kosher salt does have specific culinary uses, but not as a dissolved or blended ingredient.
There is no global standard on table or kosher salt crystal sizes.
As with most recipes that do not specify a weight, use your better judgement on the amount of salt you require. You can always add more latter. Obviously the larger the crystals the less weight per volume there will be.
Also salt that is dissolved or blended tastes stronger than table salt sprinkled on top. Unrelated hint: if you want stronger table salt, grind it a little finer.
Also, Kosher salt (in the U.S.A.) doesn't have added iodine, while other table salts (in the U.S.A) do have that additive. I guess many recipes call for Kosher salt because it is perceived as purer/healthier, but as far as I know you can't tell is salt has added iodine just by tasting it.
@J.A.I.L. You can get table salt with or without iodine in the US. At least here, they normally sit next to each other at the grocery story.
@J.A.I.L. OP is NOT in the USA, as are most people in the world
@TFD Based on his profile, J.A.I.L is not in the US either, but since OP referenced a US recipe presumably using US style ingredients, describing those ingredients seems quite reasonable so she can compare to locally available ones.
@J.A.I.L. The choice to user kosher salt is very often based on the size and shape of the crystals, not the lack of iodine or supposed purity. For example, it is much easier to pinch with one's fingers than table salt.
@SAJ14SAJ Why is J.A.I.L's comment then not on main post? Do you actually "pinch" salt, surely you use a measuring spoon or scale?
@TFD Yes, I actually do pinch or pickup salt with my fingers when making eggs, or in savory cookery. Pretty much just like you see all the cooks on cooking shows here. I rarely measure salt. Except in baking, when I always measure, either by volume or weight.
I dind't know wether to put the comment here or in the main post. I decided to do it here to complete the sentence "Kosher salt is just larger crystals" as, as far as I knew (thank you @derobert for the correction), in the U.S.A. there's less people with iodine deficiencies because processed foods and table salt have added iodine. Where I live (Spain) women wanting to get pregnant or those who already are, usually take iodine supplement pills, and I've been told it's not common in the U.S.A. I don't know what might be the situation in India.
@J.A.I.L. Some countries with regular table sale is iodised have reported iodine deficiencies due to people moving to "fashionable" "natural" salts (not everyone eats processed foods)
The best peanut butter, in my subjective opinion, contains peanuts and nothing else. Liquidize the nuts in a food processor until it's as smooth as you want it; and you're done.
Peanut butter made this way might go a bit stiff if you leave it, but give it a good stir and it'll go back to normal.
Good wholefood brands sell ready-made peanut butter of this kind, with only peanuts on the ingredients list.
In your recipe:
Salt and honey are added for flavour
Peanut oil is added to make the consistency thinner
If you like those flavours, then by all means add salt and honey.
Kosher salt comes in flakes or large grains. If you add it late, or don't process the mixture for long, then there will be grains of salt in the mixture; you may like this. I'm fairly sure that since peanuts are oily, not watery, it's possible for grains of salt to remain in there a long time without dissolving.
If you use table salt -- or if you use kosher salt and process for a long time -- the salt will fully dissolve and its flavour will be evenly spread through the mixture.
thanks for your answer. can you tell me the taste of peanut butter which doesn't contain any extra flavour?
Like peanuts, ground up! :-) Seriously.
@SAJ14SAJ I haven't tasted that ever, that's why I asked. It is salty or sweet?
Try one of your peanuts--just eat it (but not the shell!) :-) That is what peanut butter without any salt or sweetener would taste like. It is rich and fatty, savory, but not salty and not sweet. Homemade peanut butter also tends to have a somewhat gritty mouth feel.
@SAJ14SAJ Okay, but you had said that without salt it tastes bland! :(
In my opinion it does, compared to pb with salt in it--but that would be assuming the peanuts it was ground from are unsalted. Peanuts and peanut butter are like any other food--salt helps enhance the flavor.
Salt is a personal preference. You tend to get accustomed to it, so anything unsalted tastes bland. If you usually put lots of salt in your cooking, you'll probably want salt in your peanut butter. If you usually salt your food lightly, or not at all, you'll enjoy PB with little or no salt. Make a small amount (perhaps with a pestle and mortar). Try it without salt, then try stirring in some salt, and try that.
I agree that pure peanuts make excellent peanut butter. I used to (as a customer) grind them in a machine in a store called The Good Earth, in Utah. I believe they have to be the right kind of peanuts, though. In my experience it stays fluffy for a really long time after grinding it, though. If oil forms on the top, it's super old (probably months, at least). Nowadays, I just eat Skippy Natural.
@Aquarius_Girl Mine just tasted like fluffy peanut butter. It wasn't particularly salty or sweet. It wasn't bland, either. If you've never had it, it would still be recognizeable as peanut butter in appearance, texture, and flavor. I don't think they added salt to the peanuts before grinding, but I could be wrong.
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30210 | must I toast bread over a flame or are HOT toasters still made somewhere?
I am tired of waiting and getting only dehydrated bread with a hint of color.
Toasters these days just don't get hot enough! My sister has the family GE model we grew up with and having toast at her place (50yr old thing doesn't pop any longer) makes me want a REAL toaster too. Apparently others agree: http://www.flamingsteel.com/me-blogging-the-dog/the-last-great-toaster
I perused review sites but don't see any explicit HEAT rating. What criteria should I use in looking at manufacturers details?
Is speed equated with a hot toaster? Should I search for a brand that is considered fast?
This question seems like an oblique equipment recommendation request, which per http://meta.cooking.stackexchange.com/a/978/14401 is off topic.
Essentially he's asking for what toasters give the highest BTUs (Is that the correct unit), which isn't necessarily a "opinion" request. I think this question can stand (maybe with some edits) as is. I've had the same question and frustration and would find this valuable.
That information is best gotten from the manufacturers.
BTUs might be what I need to search for in product info then. I should start with the old toaster as comparison; would clarify matters
Pat, to avoid this getting closed, you might want to edit your question to be a little less like a rant and a little more clear about what you're actually asking.
BTU's only work in the UK, so very localised too :-)
I want hot. changed question to reflect that. old toaster is obviously hotter than what I've found so far. A fair answer to my Q might be "NO" won't find non-commercial toaster that isn't antique. here's hoping.
I agree with @SAJ14SAJ: Even if we edited out all the rants, the basis of the question would still just be "which toasters have the highest BTU/kW/whatever". That information is constantly changing and not within Seasoned Advice's domain anyway. We allow meta-shopping questions sometimes ("what should I look for in a...") but not actual "which brand should I buy" questions.
I think I would tend to disagree with the close votes... If the question was reworded a little to be more "help me find the best toaster:", I don't think it'd be too different from: http://cooking.stackexchange.com/questions/10532/are-there-significant-differences-between-different-brands-models-of-immersion-b That question also asks about brands, differences. I don't think it's too much to ask to expect a toaster question to focus on it's ability to well "toast" something well/quickly. Limiting this question as off topic is kinda nitpicky, I think. Maybe I should take this up over in Meta.
It's a bit tricky to tell from your question what your standards for "real" toasters are, and it sounds like you're exaggerating. Every toaster I or my family has ever owned has been capable of doing a lot more than dehydrating bread and adding a hint of color; they've all been able to burn the toast if you set them too high.
That said, at least as of four years ago, very hot toasters still existed. I have one of these, and it's hot/fast enough that the only problem I have is that sometimes when the toast is sufficiently browned, the center of the slice still isn't as hot as I'd like. I'm sure this isn't the only such toaster; if you look for negative reviews complaining of that problem, you can probably find others.
ha ha, never thought about looking at negative reviews! under 75 seconds hits the nail on the head
A toaster works by converting electricity to heat using resistive heating. This is going to approach 100% efficiency (a little is lost as light). So the heat output (in BTU/hr) is going to be about 3.4 × watts. So, more or less, 5000BTU/hr is the most you can get on a standard US circuit.
The real question is how effectively the toaster delivers that heat to the bread (etc.). That's going to mean looking at reviews, not heat specs.
Depending on what you want, maybe just heat a cast iron pan to ridiculous and toast one side at a time?
yes, have done that in a pan and results are interesting but still good. not quite same somehow. have used under grill but that's a bit excessive for a single slice.
sorry, don't understand 'effectively delivers heat'
@PatSommer A lot of toasters use more or less the same wattage, so they're generating almost the same amount of heat. But they perform differently, because some are effective in directing that heat at the bread and some aren't. That's what I mean by how effectively the toaster delivers the heat.
more wattage transferred to coils? hand over toaster method best judge of that?
@PatSommer No, more wattage (heat) transferred from coils to the bread. Best method to judge for that would be to make a slice of toast.
Don't forget to consider the number of slices -- a 4 slice 1200 Watt toaster might not toast as fast as a 2 slice 1000 Watt toaster. And look for the ones that mention that they're cool to the touch -- that suggests that they're not radiating all of the heat away from the toaster (and getting more to the bread)
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63903 | How does pineapple affect umami when used in vegan-fish-sauce recipes?
I have seen mushroom and wakame as ingredients in fish sauce substitutes but does pineapple just take the cake?
A number of recipes are simmering fresh chopped pineapple along with salty ingredients before straining: does that add umami or in any way help extract umami?
This would make an excellent source of the sourness and sweetness to a dish at the same time... Salt is an excellent addition to pineapple; in SE Asia, it is common to see table salt being consumed with pineapple, and Malaysia and Singapore is famous for pineapple and fish curry. IMO pineapple is an excellent flavour balancer and adds umami to the dish...
Salt is not infrequently recommended in thai recipes as a better substitute for fish sauce than soy sauces etc ... probably because the role of the fish sauce is mostly adding salt, just as you would with Light Soy Sauce in chinese recipes...
yes, salt must be compensated for in recipes omitting fish sauce. but the umami?
This has been edited to ask if pineapple adds umami, but in the original form it appeared to be asserting that it added umami and asking... how much? Can you clarify/confirm? Are you talking about recipes for the fish sauce substitute itself including pineapple? Are you maybe just asking what it adds to the sauce?
What raw pineapple MIGHT do - pure speculation - is split some proteins that are in the recipe anyway into their compound aminos (by merit of the proteases which make raw pineapple tickle your mouth, not by smashing them to pieces with the pineapple :). That could indeed help with umami.
Umami is the result of glutamic acid (ions) getting in touch with the tongue. Glutamic acid in fish sauce is the result of a fermentation process, which involves bacteria doing the work of breaking down fish components. Glutamic acid easily dissolves in water though. This is after all, how it was detected millennia ago and centuries ago verified by creating glutamic acid salts: Cooking seaweed in water and boiling the result down.
The wakame is added due to its natural content of glutamic acid. There isn't anything special the pineapple can/has do to it that regular water can't do.
Therefore the answer is: No, the purpose of the pineapple is not to increase the glutamic acid of the substitute.
Will vote this the correct answer soon; just want 100% sure... as rackandboneman hypothesized, something might be going on. Over on veganmiam.com, she says pineapple juice "produces the funky smell". Wish there was a glutamate test strip like for PH that would show an increase with the addition of juice.
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112599 | why pepitas (pumpkin seeds) taste like blue cheese?
Many nondairy 'blue cheese' recipes are pepita based.
It actually mimics blue reasonably well according to omnivores.
What constituent(s) creates this flavor? Recipes include acid and salt and sometimes yeast but where is the blue?
I've looked at short-chain fatty acids etc like propionic, butyrate, valeric (pentanoic), decanoic and lauric; even the goaty 3-methylbutanoic present in blue cheese.
Doesn't correspond with pepitas palmitic, oleic, and linoleic so what could it be?
This is a typical recipe by https://lowcarb-vegan.net/vegan-blue-cheese/
Ingredients
1/2 cup (70 g) unroasted pumpkin seeds
1/4 cup (60 ml) water
1/2 cup (120 ml) vinegar or lemon juice
3 tablespoons nutritional yeast
1 tablespoon tahini
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder or a small clove of fresh garlic
1 teaspoon salt
200 gram (7 oz) firm tofu
1/3 to 1/2 cup (80-120 ml) neutral tasting coconut oil (optional)
Can you share recipes or link regarding "most nondairy blue cheese are pepita based" ? what is "omnis" ?
How much processing is done in these unspecified recipes? I'm wondering if there's a reaction taking place that changes the fatty acids
I've eaten pumpkin seeds, and I've eaten blue cheese, and they absolutely don't taste the same...
@Max see the urban dictionary. Somewhat derogatory term shortened from omnivore.
should have specified these are quick cheese substitutes. There are now properly mold ripened nutcheeses available
Have you had a non-vegan attest that the mixture is actually reminiscent of blue cheese? My suspicion is that it's just "funky umami" but otherwise not terribly blue-cheese-like.
I'm certainly not a food scientist or chemist, but could it be the umami that is being likened to, or substituting for blue cheese? Pepitas are pretty high in glutamic acid at 13258mg per 227 grams of seeds. Glutamic acid, I believe, is a source of umami.
now reading here https://www.journalofdairyscience.org/article/S0022-0302(50)91954-0/pdfI'm about methyl ketones which is way over my head. Heptanone-2 specifically mentioned. Also wondering about characteristic 'slight ammonia smell' of blue.
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95016 | Is eggnog just a milkshake?
Last year I tried eggnog for the first time, following a homemade recipe involving egg, cream and sugar. The result tasted like a thin vanilla ice-cream milkshake (with spices and alcohol).
Recipes for homemade ice-cream use similar ingredients (without spices and alcohol).
Is this just superficial, or do the definitions of ice-cream milkshake and eggnog overlap so that it is reasonable to conceive of eggnog as a flavoured milkshake?
(I am looking for a technical answer that rules out my milkshake theory, or suggests it's an acceptable substitute.)
Milkshake is flavoured milk. There is no milk in eggnog that you could say is the base you enrich with flavour. There is Lait de poule where the milk is used.
Definitely not. I don't think I have enough to add a full answer in terms of knowledge and explanation but I do want to add a minor antecdote. There are eggnog milkshakes! Which are quite possibly the superior form of both beverages. They use eggnog ice cream, or just some other ice cream and then instead of milk, use eggnog as the thinner. No alcohol in them, but still soooooo goooooooood.
Grocery store eggnog doesn't seem to contain alcohol.
@Joshua In many states, grocery stores can't sell liquor. That's likely why you don't see this in the US (I never have.)
Mine does, but it's still impossible to get drunk on eggnog.
@Joshua The grocery stores in my area (Maine) sell eggnog with alcohol or without. The ones without alcohol are located in the dairy section and are typically refrigerated, whereas the ones with alcohol are located in the liquor section at room temperature and have a significant alcohol content. All that being said, I'm not sure how that in any way impacts the quality of the question.
Not really.
For a start there's no milk in it (there's cream, but milk is the defining factor in a milkshake). Second, egg isn't a normal ingredient in a milkshake, and neither is alcohol. Of course they can be added, but they take you away from what's normally meant by the term. When that happens it's normally reflected in the name.
In general, trying to precisely categorise foods is an exercise in futility - defining a category that includes everything you'd expect it to invariably includes things that don't belong, or you end up with categories so broad as to be useless.
Is a hot dog a sandwich?
Even calling eggnog a cocktail (An alcoholic drink consisting of a spirit or spirits mixed with other ingredients, such as fruit juice or cream.) is slightly problematic, as "cocktail" usually implies it's mixed just before serving, rather than bottled in between (as is common with eggnog).
According to the cube rule, hotdog is technically a taco :) http://cuberule.com/
I use cream in my milkshake every time.
@Luciano So.... pizza is toast in Naples, a quiche in Chicago, and a taco in New York... that sheds so much light on the pizza wars.
@bruglesco you're probably not alone. Even more people probably use sugar (in some form, such as syrup) every time. Neither cream nor sugar defines it, milk does, hence the name
Must I've never seen eggnog premixed with alcohol. That is mixed in later. Probably this is due to liquor laws in different (US) states. In may states you can only buy liquor at specially sanctioned stores. I could see this in states where liquor can be bought in grocery stores though.
I would think it's the ice-cream that is the key ingredient that defines a milkshake. You can't just shake up some milk and call it a milkshake. I'm not sure that the name of things is the best evidence of it's contents. Head-cheese is not cheese, for example.
@JimmyJames it's not eggnog until the alcohol is mixed in, it's mix for eggnog. Eggnog is, according to every dictionary and recipe I've seen, an alcoholic drink, and you presumably wouldn't drink the mix. But licencing laws can lead to strange products. As for ice cream defining milkshake - maybe where you are. Here as milkshake with ice cream used to be a luxury milkshake, and you can still buy "milkshake powders" (thickener and flavouring basically) intended to be added to just milk
@ChrisH: I pour and drink eggnog from the carton. My family thinks milkshake powders are for camping when you can't add ice cream.
Another Is it a hotdog or a sandwich illustration.
A milkshake never contains egg directly, but the ice cream in a milkshake might. (Of course that leads into other debates about different styles of ice cream, and the difference between ice cream and frozen custard...)
@ChrisH I believe you but typically when you get a carton of "Egg Nog" in places I've lived, there's no alcohol in it. Perhaps a liquor store could carry it (not sure) but it's not really in their wheelhouse to carry things that expire like that. That's my guess. I think people like to pick their poison, too. Liquor laws vary greatly from state to state and they often don't make much sense.
@JimmyJames you may be on to something there. All recipes I've seen include alcohol, and most dictionary definitions, which the notable exceptions being American.
Cube rule is awesome. A sushi is actually not a sushi, but a toast... In no situation is a sushi actually a sushi...!
@JimmyJames "I would think it's the ice-cream that is the key ingredient that defines a milkshake." I can honestly say that I've never had a milkshake that used ice cream as an ingredient, I think that's a cultural thing.
@Nelson Typically "sushi" is an uncountable noun.
@Pharap Just as "rice" is, naturally.
@Pharap Yeah, I've been thoroughly corrected on this. Must be regional. Go for Custard-based if you try one.
@ChrisH I've actually encountered three different varieties of "eggnog" in my region of the US. There is alcoholic eggnog containing whiskey, brandy or other spirits. There is a very heavy, undrinkably thick non-alcoholic concoction intended, as you say to be mixed (and thinned) with the alcohol of your choosing. Finally, there is moderately thick non-alcholic eggnog intended to be consumed as sold, which would be a bit too thin if mixed with alcohol. The third is the by far the most commonly seen commercially around here.
Egg nog is a custard. The only difference is you don't freeze it in an ice cream mixer. It has all the same ingredients as ice cream except a heavier use of alcohol.
I haven't tried but I'd bet you could freeze it, too.
Egg nog ice cream is excellent IMO, better tasting than the drink to me. The spices come through better and if you like the adult hit, a smaller amount of alcohol seems to impart a smoother flavor without affecting the freezing.
That depends on your definition of custard! Many say it hasd to be cooked to be custard, while others permit freezing as well. Eggnog can be raw.
Cooked eggnog- like what you buy in the grocery store and what I make at home- is a custard. Traditional eggnog is basically just eggs and bourbon/rum and is not a custard at all.
@ChrisH I've never come across a definition of custard that referenced freezing at all... Is this one of those US/UK language things, like how in the US 'sherbet' is apparently a frozen thing rather than a powder.
@Sobachatina I decided to make egg nog for the first time in years just a couple of days ago. I looked at two saved recipes titled "Traditional Egg Nog". Both use eggs, bourbon and rum, sugar and cream and milk. So do the others I've seen. Of those two, one is from Bon Appetit and the other is from Cook's Illustrated.
@Spagirl neither had I until searching earlier today, but dictionary.com says "baked, boiled, or frozen".
Would most agree that egg nog is a custard base or at least a custard-like base as an accurate description? To me an unset custard base regardless of if a cooked or uncooked egg nog seems accurate. You are basically going through the custard motions without gelling it or at least only slightly.
@Rob- sure. But they traditionally aren't cooked and that's a requirement for being called a custard- not just containing eggs and milk. Sorry if I was ambiguous by abbreviating the ingredient list.
@spagirl- In the US, 'Custard' != 'Ice Cream' except among people who only know the word "Custard" in the context of "Frozen Custard" sold at some fast food places. There are several types of Ice Cream and a custard base is only one of them. That said- custard style eggnog does make a fabulous base for custard style ice cream.
Go into a supermarket this time of year in the southeastern U.S. (maybe other parts of the country too, I don't know), and you can usually find jugs or cartons of "boiled custard". It is very similar to eggnog, and sold as an alternative to eggnog...but I don't think anyone I know could explain what the difference actually is.
For one thing, eggnog (around in one form or another for hundreds of years) significantly predates milkshakes. Even switching the order of invention, though, still no :)
A milkshake is based on ice cream and milk, blended with flavoring. Some variants don't include ice cream, but a milkshake is always thick and cold. It doesn't include any eggs. You could have an eggnog flavored milkshake by adding spices and alcohol, but it wouldn't be eggnog.
Eggnog must include eggs, with cream and milk added to make it richer and thicker. Traditionally it is alcoholic (and milkshakes traditionally are not). While not served hot, it is never as cold a drink as a milkshake.
Where do you find milkshakes that don't contain ice-cream? I've never seen such a thing. I thought you have ice cream in order to call it a milkshake in the US and that's why it's a 'shake' at McDonald's or a 'frosty' at Wendy's.
@JimmyJames the sticking point on the fast food versions would be the milk, not the ice cream. Even milk could be stretched to be made with cream as that is still milk fat. But once you go non-dairy, then you have cross over and using milk-shake is false.
@dlb I found this which says it's state by state. Bizarrely in Mass. you can't even have cream or ice-cream in a 'milkshake'. Where I grew up we'd get milkshakes made with frozen custard which isn't too far off of eggnog.
Yeah, the whole "frappe" thing in Massachusetts is still weird to me :)
@Erica I was just totally wrong so carry on.
Interesting bit from the "Milkshake" article on Wikipedia: When the term "milkshake" was first used in print in 1885, milkshakes were an alcoholic whiskey drink...described as a "sturdy, healthful eggnog type of drink, with eggs, whiskey, etc., served as a tonic as well as a treat". (Emphasis mine.)
Interesting! I'm going to stand by my answer as "current usage" but clearly history says something different.
My mom used to make home-made milk shakes in the blender without ice cream using milk, ice and vanilla. They were pretty damn good from what I remember.
The similarity is not superficial in that the ingredients and preparation of eggnog is essentially the same as those for making a custard style ice cream. In effect, drinking eggnog is drinking unfrozen custard style ice cream base, with some liquor thrown in.
The difference is in the subsequent preparation: a milkshake involves blending ice cream and milk and flavorings into a frozen thick drinkable concoction while eggnog is traditionally served warm.
Is eggnog a milkshake? No the final product is too different. Is the similarity superficial? Again no, the ingredients and initial preparation are essentially the same (though the proportions will differ).
No. Eggnog is more a thin custard (especially the lightly cooked versions, the raw egg recipes less so)
Disagree with the review comment. There are better answers here, but it is an answer.
A milkshake is made from milk, while eggnog is made from cream. If an eggnog has milk, it is technically a form of milkshake. However, this would be stretching the definition of milkshake. The same applies to the cocktail argument.
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94328 | Is a blowtorch suitable for browning/caramelising steamed food?
I have started using a microwave steamer to quickly cook the bulk of meals, including mushrooms, gem squash, sausages, steak. These specific examples are extra tasty when browned or caramelised (that is, when fried or baked instead of steamed) but of course that doesn't happen in the microwave.
I considered purchasing a blowtorch, but everything I read about blowtorches including here on Seasoned Advice limits them to specialised tasks such as creme brulee.
Can a culinary blowtorch be used as a general-purpose browning and caramelising tool for steamed food?
Browning with a blowtorch is the standard method for finishing meat and fish cooked sous-vide. I see no reason why it couldn't also be used for microwaved or steamed dishes, with the caveat that dishes that have too high of a water content will never brown properly (instead, the surface will pop and boil). I'd advise experimenting a bit, to see which side of the "too much water" each dish is on, and whether simply blotting the surface dries them enough for browning.
UPDATED TO ADD: I'm also going to advise you to get a hardware store blowtorch, not a culinary blowtorch. A standard plumber's blowtorch is cheaper, and has significantly more flame and a larger fuel tank.
You might be able to dry the top of the food first w/ a hair dryer, or at least a fan. Or a warm oven
You can also use them (blowtorches) to melt cheese for nachos. When my wife makes nachos I hear the microwave beeping and usually get some soggy ones. When I make them there is a click then the glorious hissing of a MAPP torch melting and lightly browning the cheese.
@RudyB I used to do this but starting with an initial softening in the microwave. I found a blowtorch to very rapidly brown a small area and only a very thin surface layer. The plumbing one was better than the chef's one, if held a lot further away, but even then it didn't seem a very good way of heating the bulk. I felt a wider flame would have been better
Oh, right, not a culinary blowtorch. Note added to the answer.
A blowtorch can technically be used for these tasks, but it'd be annoying and inefficent to do so.
The basic issue is that a blowtorch is too hot and transfers too much heat. Quick heat transfer is exactly what you want for creme brulee, where you need to caramelize the sugar on top without overcooking the custard underneath. But the foods you mention don't brown from caramelization, but from the Maillard reaction, which takes place at a lower temperature over a longer period of time (technically at higher temperatures too, but you wouldn't notice because you're also turning it to charcoal). If you turn the blowtorch on a microwaved steak, you can easily put a black crust on parts of it, but it'll be difficult and time-consuming to evenly brown it.
It is possible to get a "heat spreader" for a blowtorch, which might give you better results. Still, plan to burn a bunch of food before you get your technique down.
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126539 | What do Americans mean by Coffee and Cream?
When Americans say "Would you like cream in your coffee?", do they mean powdered creamer (milk or milk-substitute)? Basically what South Africans know as Cremora or do they put heavy or double cream in their coffee? Is cream some sort of collective noun for any type of dairy that is put into coffee?
There's also light cream (≈UK single cream) which is more likely, and half-and-half (50% light cream, 50% whole milk), which I believe to be the answer. Being neither American nor a fan of dairy in my coffee, I'll leave it to the experts to provide something definitive. I have a suspicion that "cream" could occasionally turn out to be milk, but maybe only when cultures clash. Creamer on the other hand is a substitute for the real thing, and a poor one unless you can't have dairy. See US Dairy - types of cream
@ChrisH "Cream" pretty much never means milk in the US because we would just say "milk". If you're at most restaurants and you ask for "cream" you're more likely to get half and half than anything else, in my experience. I've never seen anyone get milk when asking for cream.
@ToddWilcox I suppose I was imagining someone asking for cream as a guest in a home/workplace and getting milk because there was no cream, half&half, etc. But then in my house you'd be lucky to even get cow's milk.
Even worse: the powdered "non-dairy creamer" (awful stuff, but common in many places because it doesn't require refrigeration) is often not actually non-dairy - Kosher certification will show a "D" for dairy, but it satisfies a crazy legal definition of non-dairy - see this example from Amazon.
@ChrisH I would consider it impolite on the part of the host to not clarify what dairy is available and I doubt I'm alone. As in: "Do want anything for your coffee?"; "Just cream please"; "I'm out of half and half but I have whipping cream and whole milk"; "Oh just sugar then, thanks."
@ToddWilcox fair enough - though in your example you could make some
@manassehkatz-Moving2Codidact I think it's because it's lactose-free that they can get away with it. Big international brands just don't care. Similarly Maggi (Nestlé) coconut milk powder has the same cow's milk derivative in it (sodium caseinate - the labelling on their website is clearer than the pack I bought a while ago). It's probably the same dairy derivative in all non-non-dairy creamers.
In France, when asking for "un café-crème" in a café, you get a coffee with milk, at least in Paris; and that's more common than asking for "un café au lait" (coffee with milk). I remember my mother complaining, back in the 70's, that nearly no more cafés were offering true cream. I guess this was also a matter of hygiene: previously they would give you a little cream pot that would thereafter be used on other tables.
By "cream" they mean "creamer" -- a synthetic white liquid that has a very long shelf life and can produce unknown health problems. None of its ingredients has never been close to a cow or other animal, and it's problably made of discarded waste from nuclear power plants. Stay away from it. Sorry for the irony, but can't stress more that should not eat this.
American in English cafe: "Could I have a coffee without cream, please?" Waitress: "I'm sorry. We have no cream. I could give it to you without milk?"
Um, actually, it is already somewhat strange what Americans usually refer to as "coffee".
@Transistor Developing this slightly, in Soviet Russia one could visit a cafe and ask for coffee without cream, only to be told that the only thing available was coffee without milk. For coffee without cream they would be directed to the cafe across the street. That the two are different requires a Hegelian argument (I'm reusing a joke by Slavoj Zizek here).
Cultural reference https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_t15vNuXP0
It depends on where you go. If you're at a "coffee shop" that is at least as fancy as a starbucks, you'll almost certainly recieve half-and-half if you ask for "cream". Some places may take the term generically and ask you to be specific about half-and-half vs milk vs plant-based alternatives. Fast food joints and gas stations may or may not have half-and-half and instead have "creamer", and if you ask for "cream" and "creamer" is all they have they'll likely just give it to you and not attempt to clarify. "creamer" is always the fake stuff whatever it is.
There's no consistent answer to this, as you can see from the comments below there's it's slightly contentious.
Usually cream when offered with coffee refers to either half and half (half milk and half light cream, about 12% fat) or a non-dairy liquid creamer like Coffee Mate. The half and half could be fresh, or in little single-serve containers in which case it's probably UHT so it doesn't require refrigeration. Non-dairy creamer is almost always in single-serve containers.
Less likely it could also mean light cream or very rarely heavy cream. If it's powder people will usually say it's creamer.
I would say that actual "light cream/single cream" cream would be unusual... half-and-half is about as high a fat level as I've seen.
It's true @Sneftel, I know a few people who like light cream in their coffee, personally I think even half and half is too much.
This is generally right, but I'd emphasize that (in the US) "cream" means "half & half" or "fluid non-dairy creamer" the vast preponderance of times by putting that first. Then allow for the possibility of other options (milk, light cream etc.).
@Dave, I have lived in the U.S. all my life, and I have decades of coffee drinking behind me. "Cream" never means "fluid non-dairy creamer" to me. But half & half, yes, that's absolutely what I would expect in the context of coffee. I do take cream (i.e. half & half) in my coffee, and I will accept non-dairy creamer as a substitute if necessary, but I do not call any form of the latter "cream".
@JohnBollinger if there's a little bowl of plastic creamer containers on the restaurant table, they'd be referred to as "cream" even if they're non-dairy creamer. Or at least that is my experience.
John: it may not mean it to you, but it does to lots of other folks, particularly in the NE. I was just on a trip to Boston, asked for cream for my coffee at the hotel, and was handed some Coffee-Mate.
@Dave, I don't doubt that there is variation in usage, not only regionally but among individuals. That's what the question is about, after all, and it's in fact my point. Your claim is too strong. I do not contest that some in the U.S. will understand "cream" exactly as you describe. But it's not correct to generalize that to the whole population, nor to such a large majority that it is reasonable to ignore the minority (not to stipulate, however, that the others are a minority).
I can chime in to support the "significant variation in usage" position, as someone who will readily interpret "cream" as broadly as "anything you put in coffee that makes it light".
"most likely it's half & half or some sort of non-dairy creamer liquid." Yes, but it depends on the context. At a coffee shop and most restaurants, it will be half & half. In a hotel lobby, out-of-the way gas station, or office cafeteria, it will be non-dairy creamer (powdered or liquid) more often than not.
this answer could be improved by defining half & half, because this product isn't available in lots of places (e.g. it's basically unheard of in the UK, except in US media, where we get little idea of what it actually is beyond it being some sort of dairy product; I suspect a lot of people would incorrectly assume it's similar to our semi-skimmed milk)
There's some good comments here, I've done my best to capture them in an edit.
“Non-dairy creamer is almost always in single-serve containers.” True in restaurants, but the question doesn’t specify that. If you’re over at someone’s home, they almost-certainly do not have single-serve containers, and are going to pour whatever they mean by “cream” from a larger container (IME, usually in the cup to quart range).
At this point, as a long- time resident of mid-size cities in the US, we might note it's getting even more complicated as the number of choices proliferates. The word "cream" is increasingly a placeholder for Some-Dairy-Like-Thing as people increasingly use more than a few different soy or nut "milks" alongside a choice of cow milk derivatives - maybe a dozen options some places. In my daily life in coffee shops, servers ask "Do you want room?" and I'm old enough to understand "room for cream" but perhaps people 20 years younger don't think "cream" at all.
I did see a woman try to cream her coffee with nonfat milk. Maybe she thinks cream means something else.
tl;dr: "cream," means heavy cream or half-and-half.
For context, I live in the US.
If you visit my house and ask for cream in your coffee, I will give you heavy cream. I suppose it is possible to find light cream in the US but this is so exceedingly rare in a normal supermarket that we'd normally say it doesn't exist.
Half-and-half (approximately 1:1 cream and milk) is very common and it used in many restaurants to replace cream. It is common largely because it gives much the same feeling in one's coffee as cream but is significantly better on the health. If I had this, I would give it to you and consider it equivalent to cream.
If I didn't have cream but I had milk, I would tell you that. Most likely, I would offer by milkfat percentage I have available: whole, 2%, 1% or skim.
If I didn't have milk, I would tell you what else I have that may substitute. Lactose-free milk is increasingly common and even more so non-cow milks such as almond, oat, coconut, etc. (Soy milk, on the other hand, has nearly disappeared from American supermarkets due to an irrational fear of soy products.)
I would not offer you creamer, mostly because I drink my own coffee black and I don't ordinarily have fresh creamer on hand. Much of the creamer available in this country is sweetened and artificially flavored, French vanilla and hazelnut being very common. I have met social groups where putting this sort of creamer in your coffee is de rigueur but I cannot recall anyone who has ever called this, "cream."
In some (American) circles, "creamer," is of the dry-powder variety, which can vary from the dry version of fresh creamer to simply powdered milk of some variety. It is sometimes sweetened and often not made of any ingredient that began its life as cow milk. In any case, if all I had was powdered creamer, I may offer it to you but only with significant disclaimers.
I do not frequent Starbucks or any other coffee shop. Perhaps someone who does, or someone who works at one, can shed some light as to their corporate standards for this. There are may Americans who consider what Starbucks does to be both the original and definitive way of serving coffee.
"I suppose it is possible to find light cream in the US but this is so exceedingly rare in a normal supermarket that we'd normally say it doesn't exist." - I don't know who "we" are, but in my region of the US light cream is very easy to find beside the regular cream in normal supermarket, and in about equal quantities.
@LaconicDroid really? What part of the US do you live in? Apparently this is a regional thing. Here on the West Coast, one only finds light cream in restaurant supply stores, never in the grocery store.
I've seen it in grocery stores in the East Coast (MD), Midwest (MI) and Mountain West (CO). So maybe it's just not easily available on the West Coast?
In any Starbucks I have ever been to, if you say "cream" you will get half and half. They do usually have many other things available (different fat levels of milk, plus many non-dairy milk alternatives), but if you wanted one of those you would have to specify that.
@RoddyoftheFrozenPeas I was raised in NYC, never saw it in a store there except for specialty stores. I lived in Denver, don't remember ever seeing it at King Sooper. I live in Texas now, I've never seen it at HEB, although you can get pretty much anything at Whole Foods or Central Market (both also locally based). Not saying it's impossible to find, just that it's not a normal thing.
By "fresh creamer", do you mean liquid as opposed to powdered? AFAIK both types are made from sodium caseinate, hydrogenated vegetable oils and other yummies.
@StephanSamuel My local King Soopers in Denver carries it regularly. Maybe it's not as commonplace as, say, half&half or whipping cream, but it's definitely not impossible to find.
Downvoted, because when coffee with cream [and sugar], is ordered, 100% of the time, the consumer expects half-and-half. Never is heavy cream, light cream, or whipping cream expected. Or any variation of milk, for that matter.
On a tangent, soy milk seems to have pretty much been replaced by oat milk here in northern Europe as well, even though I'm not aware of any significant "fear of soy products" on this side of the pond, irrational or otherwise. IME soy milk tends to taste pretty nasty in coffee, though. (To be fair, so did early oat milks, too. I believe Oatly was the first brand around here to come up with a high-fat "barista" oat milk that actually tastes good in coffee, although plenty of other brands seem to have since copied their recipe.)
@IlmariKaronen I think there's a fairly wide variety of what people like in their coffee, but I'd have to agree with you that most of the non-cow milk is pretty icky, especially as you say, with low fat content. I'm told however that traditional Italian cappuccino etc. is made with non-fat cow milk, which seems enigmatic to me if it's true.
"[Half-and-half] is common largely because it gives much the same feeling in one's coffee as cream but is significantly better on the health." Assuming facts not in evidence, your honor - both the health claim (fat isn't necessarily bad for health) and the causality (it's much more likely to be a financial decision, or it could even be a matter of taste: they believe that people like half-and-half in their coffee more than they like actual cream).
Based on my experiences as a coffee drinker who has lived in 5 US states and drunk coffee in at least 14 others, here's the things they could be offering you in order of probability/common use:
Half-and-half
Full-fat milk
Liquid non-dairy creamer
Dairy heavy cream
Some form of non-dairy milk (such as oat milk or soy milk)
While liquid non-dairy creamer is the most commonly used of the above, most of the time Americans distinguish between it and "real cream"; they would be more likely to say "creamer" or a brand name than calling it "cream". However, some people and some regions make less of a distinction. Also, creamer is more likely to be called "cream" if no other options are available, such as in many workplaces.
At the same time, non-dairy milks might be offered, but outside of certain venues (e.g. vegan restaurants) the host is most likely to distinguish them from "regular cream".
There's a couple of cultural reasons why Americans are usually careful to distinguish between dairy and non-dairy options. One is that we have a strong national dairy industry and there's some dairy pride. The second is that a lot of Americans have lactose intolerance, so hosts want to make sure they know that non-dairy options are available.
Notably the probability/order shifts depending on where you are. A fancy coffee shop probably offers a lot of nondairy milks, so they're likely to be more precise/literal. A big chain probably has a single default. A diner is more likely to use non-dairy creamer (and to provide it individually packaged).
@Cascabel yeah, and the diner would have the creamer (or sometimes shelf-stable cream servings) available on the counter without asking.
Cream for coffee means "table cream" or "light cream" like this:
https://www.safeway.com/shop/product-details.960422635.html?productId=960422635
But it is common to say "cream" for half-and-half or artificial creamer, unfortunately.
By US law, "cream" is defined as:
Cream means the liquid milk product high in fat separated from milk, which may have been adjusted by adding thereto: Milk, concentrated milk, dry whole milk, skim milk, concentrated skim milk, or nonfat dry milk. Cream contains not less than 18 percent milkfat.
while "half and half" is defined as:
Half-and-half is the food consisting of a mixture of milk and cream which contains not less than 10.5 percent but less than 18 percent milkfat. It is pasteurized or ultra-pasteurized, and may be homogenized.
Can you post a synopsis of the link?
I've never heard of that product before. I would accept it as "cream", but that's certainly not what I'm thinking of when I say the word.
@JohnBollinger Canada is more clear about it. Cream that is 18% milk fat is the standard cream for coffee. https://www.obviouslygoodmilk.ca/en/products/creams/lucerne-18-coffee-cream If I was at an upscale restaurant that's what I would expect them to give me if I asked for cream for my coffee.
Well me, too, more or less, though that 18% MF cream would more typically be called "half & half" everywhere that I have lived in the U.S..
@JohnBollinger I use half-and-half at home, but it is usually lower fat, 10% milk fat is specified in Canada: https://www.sealtest.ca/en/products/creams/half-and-half-cream-10
In the U.S. the FDA defines half & half as having between 10.5% and 18% MF. The next step up from that is "[light] whipping cream", which has at least 30% MF.
@JohnBollinger and "cream" is required to be higher than "half and half" "Cream contains not less than 18 percent milkfat" https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-21/chapter-I/subchapter-B/part-131
Fair enough, @DavePhD. Except in my experience, light cream is not a product commonly seen in U.S. stores, nor, therefore, served in U.S. homes. I imagine that this is related to why many folks in the U.S. think of half & half as "cream".
Since every answer here needs a dozen comments: "coffee cream" (18%) in Canada is a relatively new thing in grocery stores (like in the past 10-15 years) and most restaurants use "half and half" (10% here) for coffee. Started seeing "table cream" (6%) around the same time, though it's not as popular. "Whipping cream" is 33-36% fat depending where you are in the country.
The Safeway link appears to be blocked outside the US. Could you provide a screenshot?
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16370 | Unbreakable microwave safe plates?
I'd like to have plates with the following characteristics:
Don't break when you drop them on the floor
Do not get hot in the microwave (like normal china)
Durable and washable (not paper plates)
Do such plates exist? If so, where might I obtain some?
(edit) Ideally they would also look more or less like standard dinner plates.
You mean, like shallow tupperware? Or do you have further criteria (aesthetics, sturdiness)?
Looking for dinner plates, mostly. shouldn't bend, plain white/simple decorations (non-translucent) would be ideal. Also I like having a smaller lip. (more space for food)
I needed something I could buy a lot of so ebay was out. I found these: http://www.corelle.com/index.asp?pageId=61&pId=270 . Break, chip and scratch resistant, microwave safe, stacks nicely, doesn't look silly. Ordering some and will see how they turn out.
One thing that hasn't been mentioned -- Corelle.
It's not completely unbreakable (and much like Pyrex, when it goes, it goes like what nico mentioned -- little tiny shards everywhere).
Supposedly, it loses its resilience to breaking over time, so newer plates are less likely to break when dropped as older ones, so this is one case where buying at a yard sale might not be best.
I don't know how the durability compares to Pyrex plates, but it looks more 'dinnerware-like' to start.
My parents have a set of Corelle, and I'm jealous of them. Simple white, so can be used in a pinch for a nicer dinner. They're also very thin so they stack very well for space savings.
Yeah this is what I just bought. The Pyrex stuff they apparently don't make anymore and I was trying to buy around 20 plates. Ebay would not have worked.
They're similar to Pyrex, especially in the breaking into a million tiny pieces department.
You people are making me want to buy a high-speed camera and break one on purpose. :P
+1 because my Corelle stuff has survived an unbelievable amount of punishment. It's possible to chip or break, but extremely difficult. The stuff is also very difficult to scratch, and immune to staining. Even turmeric won't leave the slightest discoloration.
@BobMcGee : not entirely impossible, but I have no idea how I did it.
@Joe: Are you sure it's not simply a thin layer of something stuck to the dish? Things like caramel will leave a residue. If so, running a Magic Eraser pad over it will usually take it off.
@Suzanne : do you know how old they were? I'd be interested in trying to figure out if the rumors of them becoming more brittle over time are true
The best plates I ever bought (that have all those characteristics you were asking for) were made by pyrex... Pyrex is obviously known for making great measuring cups and other glass bowls and things (and lab equipment like beakers)... But in college I found these translucent pyrex plates and they have lasted FOREVER! They don't break, and they only need a few seconds to cool after coming from the microwave... Just google "Pyrex dinner plates", but here's one link I found:
http://www.etsy.com/listing/67297041/on-sale-now-pyrex-dinner-plates-with
Edit: I just looked a little harder... The plates I have are put out by Corning (but they are pyrex) and here's an ebay search of them:
http://shop.ebay.com/sis.html?_nkw=PYREX+CORNING+FESTIVA+Spring+Green+SALAD+PLATES
Pyrex plates are very resistent but when they break then it's a big mess, I can tell you! They tend to break up in million little pieces...
Thanks for the tip about Pyrex. Though I'll have to find some of their plates that look a little more like dinner plates.
There are some Pyrex plates with gold leaf around the edges. Probably not microwave safe I think. And everyone on ebay is selling in like lots of 1-4, which is annoying. I want like 12-16.
With those requirements I'd start looking at "camping dishware" usually meant for camping and/or RV's; preferably in a polycarbonate material.
There's a line of products by GSI that are made with a polycarbonate resin. This is (for all intents and purposes) the same material that those indestructible camping water bottles and chambro food containers are made out of. There are loads of names for polycabonates, GSI calls it infinity. Here is the GSI infinity plate and the GSI infinity bowl.
You can also find them in cookware places that specialize in boaters. Of course, for boaters they might charge more.
It should be noted that if you're trying to stay away from BPA, polycarbonate is not the way to go.
Polypropylene dinner plates sound like they'd fit your requirements. Quick searching didn't find them in plain white, though. Polypropylene can be boiled, and should be fine in the dishwasher and microwave.
Other plastics would work too, and readily come in plain white. They are washable, but some specify hand-washing only, others top-rack only. You find these on Amazon, and some more too.
I recommend trying a few first to be sure they take whatever abuse you need them to.
While plastic will look like a dinner plate, it won't feel like one, being far too light.
Look for Inomata Folio series. They are polypropylene and comes in white too. It's very durable. It's Japan-made.
Can't find anywhere that says they are microwave safe...
Carlisle polycarbonate is unbreakable and microwavable. We used them at a Christian camp (institutional setting) and they can be bought in individual pieces at myBoelter.com. They do have BPA, though. Very durable and can be put into the dishwasher, too.
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29434 | Can the bacon in homemade "Bacon Salt" be made shelf stable?
After success making several fancy salts including Sriracha, smoked, and green chili I've decided to try to move in to stranger and tastier territories. As such I want to make a bacon salt. The commercial products don't use real bacon (or at least the ones I've seen) and all the do-it-yourself recipes claim it not to be shelf stable.
My hope was that cooking the bacon crisp would remove a majority of the moisture, preserving something akin to jerky. Once cooked it would be pulverized and adding have a large amount of kosher salt added to it, many times that than the weight of bacon used. I would hope that these preservation techniques being used two-fold would help make said meat candy shelf-stable.
However I worry that there is risk of some of the greases in the pulverized bacon going rancid. Is there anything I can do short of keeping it in the fridge or heat preserving the entire concoction, or is my plan likely to work?
All of my googling indicates that bacon salt is, despite the name, a vegetarian product. For example, http://lifehacker.com/5838933/make-your-own-bacon-salt They also include a recipe for real bacon salt, but it must go in the fridge.
Surely the salt would extract whatever moisture was left in the dried and pulverised bacon anyway? I'd be fascinated to hear how you made your smoked salt.
Salt is one of the best preservatives out there. I don't understand why the authors of those recipes believe that bacon salt would be capable of spoiling.
Remember that the whole reason we cure bacon is to make it shelf stable over time, a process developed before refrigeration was as it is today. Now we do it more for taste, but the salt and curing process make bacon pretty shelf stable. If you are cooking the bacon as well, before you put it in the salt, I don't see any reason not to leave the bacon salt on the counter.
I'd try leaving it on the shelf until you noticed any issues. But I'm willing to live a little more dangerously than some others. :)
This is more or less the way I was thinking. However I know that smoked bacon is still meant to be kept cool, like ambient winter temperature cool. This also assume that it will be used in a comparatively short period of time. My first batch was 1/2 cup of salt and 4 slices of bacon. Half a cup of salt is a lot of salt to go though in the short "cured bacon eating time". What the heck though, I see how long it lasts out on the counter.
So you'd be making cooked, dryed, salted pork, nearly powdered, with extra salt. You can reduce rancidity problems by storing in an airtight container with an Oxygen Absorber (example ony). Long term, I'd freeze the bacon salt, but the common, steel wool based, O2 scavengers generally seem to work well at preventing rancidity in grains, flours and oils.
Beef jerky is shelf stable, so you could try something similar with the bacon, but you're going to have a harder time getting the fatty parts shelf stable.
You could try replicating the flavors with things like liquid smoke.
@SteveinMaine "Shelf stable" doesn't necessarily mean "will last forever" - a few years is a plenty long shelf life. The question is about avoiding fat going rancid in months.
I would think that dehydrating a less fatty but similar tasting meat like prosciutto or even turkey bacon (to make a jerky) then using the standard recipe would take out the risk of the fat going rancid.
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8503 | How to make pancakes/crepes without eggs nor any liquids besides water?
I am looking for a way to make pancakes/crepes (the very thin ones), with the following limitations:
no eggs
no liquid ingredients besides water
cheap ingredients only
I've been trying something like:
360 g wheat flour
40 g corn flour
850 g water
But the problem is that they turn out non-baked inside and too crispy on the outside, besides being too thick. I've been trying on lower heat, but then it takes like over 5 minutes for each pancake, and the inside is still not baked. I read that it should take 1 minute to bake 1 pancake.
Any changes to the ingredient list, or tips for baking procedure? What might be the problem that it takes so long, and the inside gets not-baked? I try to pour the batter on the pan as thin as I can, swiping the pan with a sponge made of toilet paper dipped in rapeseed oil before each pancakes, and its a thin-edge pancake Teflon-coated pan.
OK, maybe some clarifications: I am not vegan and have no allergies.
The motivation is completely different: life on the road and for extended periods away from any sources of anything other then tap water.
The motivation is decreasing the weight and volume of stuff I need to take with me. Liquids are not good because they are heavy. Unless I need really little of them. But even then once I open the carton I probably need to use it up quick, because no fridge available.
So I am looking for ways of making pancakes out of ingredients which take up little volume and weight, and added to water can improve my pancakes. Powders are good, provided I have to add little of them. Also it has to be as low-budget as possible. Corn flour is cheap, baking powder is cheap, things like soy milk are not cheap.
I get the "cheap" and "vegan" limitations. Why the water-only? I google-find lots of vegan crepe, though they seem to all use soy-milk.
@sdg - I could see a casein allergy combined with a soy allergy here.
@justkt Coconut milk and rice milk would be alternatives there.
@ceejayoz - yeah, beyond not wanting milk, nuts, or soy I'm not sure.
You might wanna try this simple crepe recipe I have here miernik. It's simple and easy to cook! :)
Given your updated criteria, what about using powdered milk for crepes and pancakes? Powdered milk tends to be very inexpensive. You can usually find in in the baking aisle at groceries in the U. S. The powdered milk will last you for a long time.
You can also get powdered eggs. Just google for them.
As Martha astutely commented below, look for recipes for pancake mixes that require adding only water and pack those.
See if you can find a recipe for making your own "complete - just add water" pancake mix. You could also just buy a complete mix, although it would probably be less cost-effective.
Given the revised/expanded question, upvoting this answer.
The powdered milk was not easy to find and not cheap - the only thing which look like powdered milk did cost 2 EUR for a 250 gram bag, that is like 5 USD/lb, and that was in a huge, cheap supermarket, and other supermarket chains didn't have it at all. I tried: 350 grams wheat flour, 50 grams powdered milk and 1 liter water. And the result was not good at all - too crispy, difficult to roll, and took 6 minutes per pancake to make it feel not raw. Was that too little powdered milk?
@miernic - recipes you want to try would be something like: http://allrecipes.com//Recipe/complete-pancake-mix/Detail.aspx or: http://www.food.com/recipe/the-master-mix-homemade-bisquick-substitute-45055 or even better: http://vegetarian.lovetoknow.com/Pancakes_Recipe_No_Eggs (follow the instructions on your powdered milk to sub for the milk quantity). Google will give you the best base here: http://www.google.com/search?q=just+add+water+pancake+mix+recipe
@miernik - also, while $5/lb is a bit more than I see for powdered milk, you have to realize that you get a lot more use per gram out of powdered milk than out of milk itself. It goes quite far, making it relatively inexpensive per gram/oz.
@miernik : try asking for a product called Nido. It's made by Nestlé, and I believe it's available in Europe. It's not the same 'powdered milk' that we get in the US, as it's made from whole milk, not skim.
powdered milk, powdered egg, wheat flour and tap water you can do very cheap crêpes. But you will have lot of extra powder if you do the recipe only once. Milk/some fat for crêpes helps to have soft ones, if you have too much water or not enough fat you will have small holes all over and more crispy result.
Since you're actually trying to find a lightweight, long shelf-life alternative to eggs and milk, powdered milk and powdered eggs are probably your best alternatives.
If you want to have a mix-and-go arrangement, you're going to need dough conditioners and fillers that help prevent gluten from forming when you mix with liquid. Those would include ascorbic acid, alternative flours like malted barley or tapioca starch mixed with your wheat flour, and so on. Some will have other impacts on flavor and texture; buckwheat will add a nutty flavor and a crispier texture.
However, if you are more flexible, I would recommend rehydrating the milk and eggs before mixing in flour, to minimize the formation of gluten. You have the same need when making pancakes with the normal ingredients, so it won't be any different here. You need to gently mix in the flour and other dry ingredients as the last step, and let the batter stay somewhat lumpy, or, for crepes, let the batter rest for a good 30 minutes to allow the strands of gluten to relax again.
You seem to be concerned about cost. Powdered whole eggs are about $12-14/lb here, but this corresponds to roughly 48 eggs, which means you're paying roughly what you'd pay for higher quality eggs in the US (.25-30 cents each). Powdered milk, preferably spray-dried, is used at roughly 25 grams per 250 ml of "milk", so about .20 Euro per 250ml, which is cheaper than fresh milk where I live (though I don't buy the cheapest ones).
Additionally, you will need some form of fat, if not for flavor, for the purpose of preventing sticking to the pan, even with nonstick cookware. Also, it helps to have some in your batter because it helps reduce gluten formation. If you can't carry butter because of its shelf life, at least carry some vegetable oil.
I've seen water+flour+fat-only pancakes of the thickness of crepes in Chinese cooking, but these are not browned, so you won't get the same thing you're expecting if you're trying to make crepes.
If you don't mind crossing cultural boundaries, ground, soaked mung beans and ground rice are used in bindaeddeok, Korean style pancakes that are thicker than crepes but generally thinner than American pancakes. They can contain other ingredients in the batter, and are served with a dipping sauce made with soy sauce and vinegar, along with a few other flavorful ingredients (scallions, sesame, chili, perhaps). A similar concept exists in Southern India: Dosas, which are often made from ground urad dal, a kind of lentil, and ground rice, fermented at a warm temperature at least overnight, and often served with onions and chilies, in one of the simpler forms. Neither one of these resemble crepes in texture, however. In Vietnam, turmeric, flour and coconut milk are used in a stuffed pancake as well.
For pancakes, you will need baking powder, or, if you're using buttermilk powder instead, at least baking soda. For crepes this isn't necessary.
This is a job for dry masa flour. Having tried water-only pancake mix, a warm tortilla is infinitely more satisfying.
Is "masa flour" the same thing as "corn flour"?
@miernik - masa is different than corn flour. See here: http://recipes.howstuffworks.com/what-is-masa-harina.htm
The masa suggestion is right on the spot. You just need to add water, not even salt, and you can make excellent tortillas anywhere - but they will not be crepes, definitely: different flavor. If you want to stick with flour and corn meal, I suggest you take with you a small bottle of olive oil. Stable at room temperature, a little goes a long way and even imparts some flavor.
As it has already been remarked, masa is not corn flour but the result of a much more complex process that makes the corn proteins more available (this should be useful to you).
The product sold as BisQuick http://www.bettycrocker.com/Products/Bisquick/Default and more generally as "biscuit mix" in North America works great, when camping, for both pancakes and dumplings - add more water for pancakes, less for dumplings. It has baking powder in it. Usually we have powdered milk with us when camping, and we mix up a little to make the batter with, but there's no particular chemical reason to do this, it's just a way to get some milk into people over the course of a trip. BTW, dumplings in a spicy stew or chili are a great alternative to serving them with bread, in circumstances where carrying bread is difficult.
If cost or availability are an issue for you, here are some sites that tell you how to make your own. I haven't tested these. http://factoidz.com/biscuit-mix-making-and-using-biscuit-mix-for-quick-meals/ or http://baking.about.com/od/pancakes/r/biscuitmix.htm or http://www.gardenguides.com/140102-quick-biscuit-mix-recipe.html
Preparing a thin batter without something that will congeal as it cooks (protein...egg) is going to be difficult.
Looking at your ingredients (but not the quantities) I'd think you were making tortillas. If you want to stick with the unleavened route, I'd try a dough that you can roll out thinly (or press with a tortilla press)
The thing is, that I had the 90% wheat + 10% corn flour mix to work for me some months before, and now it doesn't any more. I start to wonder maybe its because the flour absorbed water, because I store it in a room with 95% humidity and I am using flour which I bought about a year ago, maybe if I try with new, dry flour it will work again?
I would add some baking powder, and if you want it fluffy you can use sparkling water - the bubbles help it rise a little.
Both of these are cheap ingredients.
But I wonder - what is your motivation?
He tagged it vegan, possibly that.
OK, there have been some misunderstanding here... The vegan tag is just there as this is probably useful to vegan people. My motivation is completely different - I live on the road, like to live in remote places where I can't have access to buying anything, so I only want to use ingredients which don't take up a lot of space and can be stored a long time without a fridge. Sparkling water is not an option - it needs to be bought in a shop and takes up a lot of space and weight. Normal water can be accessed anywhere. I have no allergies.
I make both vegan pancakes and crepes using:
-water
-vegetable oil
-white flour
-baking powder
-Sometimes I add flax seed
and I blend it before cooking them. The difference for the pancake and the crepe is how much I spread out the batter.
If you are going to post a recipe like this, it generally helps to add the amount of each ingredient.
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20507 | Scaling problems with a cake - mousse layer increases more than other layers
We've come up with a recipe for a cake that has four different layers (a dough base plus fillings) and is then covered in chocolate mousse. We tested that recipe as a small sample and concluded that the ideal proportion was to have 70 grams of base layers for 80 grams of chocolate mousse, creating a tight cylindric 150 gram cake. So far, so good.
We then proceeded to make a bigger version, with a wider mold, which would weight 1.88 kilograms, so we scaled our recipe and found out that 875 grams of base layers for 1kg of chocolate mousse. But the problem is, the mousse layer becomes so large that it collapses.
Fixing this is fairly obvious: use less mousse. Maybe, since the mousse is less dense than all the other layers, increasing its total weight has a much bigger impact in terms of volume. But how can we define our recipe in terms of volume rather than weight, then?
I feel like we're missing something very obvious here, but if the proportions of the recipe are the same as the small, initial version, why do we get such different results? How can we scale the recipe in order to achieve a consistent amount of mousse, regardless of the size we attempt to make (i.e. what kind of math is required to make a 1kg, 2kg and 3kg cake from one single recipe / set of proportions, considering the form factor stays the same -- still round, same height, just different diameter -- if it's even possible to do so)?
This sounds less cooking and more physics. ^^
There's a few confusing things to me in your question. You talk about "then covered in chocolate mousse" and also "the mousse layer" - are you covering the cake in mousse or is there a whole layer of mousse? Are you asking how to scale the amount of mousse in terms of the math or are you asking how to make a large batch of mousse logistically?
@rfusca I've edited the question to attempt to clarify those confusing bits, but in effect 1) I'm covering the cake in mousse, and 2) I'm asking how to scale in terms of the math.
Density = mass / volume, so if you double the mass of mousse, the volume should also double. The only way you can get more than double volume is if the density decreases, which I doubt is happening.
If you're covering the sides and top with mousse, than mass--which is directly related to volume--isn't going to help, you need to think about surface area. For a cylindrical cake frosted on the sides and top, the surface area and volume are
SA = pi d^2 / 4 + pi d h
V = pi h d^2 / 4
with d the diameter and h the height. You could imagine two cakes of the same mass, one thin and very broad with a very big surface area, the other a bit tall and small around with much smaller surface area. So you'll need to take both height and diameter into account when figuring how much more mousse you need.
Edit
We can simplify a bit. The ratio of new mousse to old mousse in volume or mass should be the same as the ratio of new SA to old SA. Using your edit that the height stays the same:
Ratio = SA_new / SA_old = d_new / d_old * (d_new + 4h) / (d_old + 4h)
I'm going to assume that your height is pretty big, and that four times the height is maybe getting close to the bigger diameter. Then we could approximate the ratio above (there is some height h such that 4h is between d_old and d_new such that)
Ratio = d_new^2 / d_old^2
So if you're going from an 8-inch diameter to a 12-inch diameter you'd want to make 144 / 64 = 2.25 times the mousse. And, as this is pretty rough, I'd add a little to that to be safe and make 2.5 times the mousse. (And having a little extra mousse doesn't seem like the worst thing in world.) If my guess about the height is wrong, just measure and use the actual formula, you'll get better results! Always make a little more than the you expect to need though, because nothing's worse than having not quite enough.
You are right. The top layer cannot be scaled like the other layers can, and the shape and size of our mold cannot be ignored. I just wish there was a more straightforward way to scale it without distorting the final result so much. A rule of thumb, perhaps? Anyway, thanks for the answer!
The rough approximation is that surface area grows with the square, volume with the cube. So if you double something (measuring diameter or radius) you get 2²=4 times the surface area, but 2³=8 times the volume. If you measure weight, which is more or less volume, 8 times the cake = 4 times the mousse (0.5). But 3³=27 times the cake = 3²=9 times the mousse (0.33). So there just isn't a linear scaling that works.
@derobert right (and +1), and when the height is held constant (as in this case) even a pure power rule like (volume ratio)^2/3 won't be good, even though it would make a good rule of thumb in a spherical case.
Linear scaling will not work, indeed. What really seems more straightforward and safe right now is to figure out the scaled recipes empirically, then (if it's still necessary or worth the trouble) build an alternative, non-linear scaling model based on those experiments. Thanks a lot for your help!
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20931 | How to get crispy vegetables chips/fries without frying?
Specifically for sweet potatoes, I'd like to get crispy fries via the oven rather than a fryer. Here are some pointers I've read in other recipes:
Cuts must be as equal as possible to ensure even cooking
Wash off excess starch / let raw fries sit in a bowl of cold water to remove excess starch
Also, I just purchased a mandolin so I'd like to hear any techniques/advice on getting crispy vegetable chips.
Thanks in advance for the help.
-- Edit 1 --
Unfortunately, my results have been disappointing and inconsistent. With the thinnest setting on my mandolin, I sliced up some sweet potatoes and beets. I've tried some of the tips mention on the Chowhound. I've tried a variety of heat settings but I haven't found the sweet spot of heat and time just yet. With those two variables I really don't want to perform 10-30 trial runs but it's looking like I need to if I want to determine the best configuration. I'm going to try some other tips and report back.
There are lots of recipes for oven-"fried" sweet potato chips (crisps) and fries (chips) and I'll let you search that part. I've noticed a wide variation in recommended oven temperatures, from as low as 350 to as high as 450. Though I've never had great success with crispiness, my overall best results were with a temp of 425.
Crispiness with sweet potatoes is notoriously difficult due to the high water and sugar content (which will caramelize and make them appear and to some extent taste burnt, usually long before they crisp up). There's some discussion of this on Chowhound.
Key points seem to be:
remove as much surface moisture as possible prior to cooking
avoid overcrowding the pans, especially when cooking thicker cuts
use a convection oven if possible
If you have success please report back and tell us what worked!
Thanks for the feedback! I will be making some chips within the week so I will post my findings.
I would also add getting the oil good and hot in the oven beforehand - put it in at least 20 minutes before adding the potatoes (be careful of hot oil splattering). As for drying, I usually par boil my potatoes for 5 minutes before cooking, allowing plenty of time for them to steam dry before they go in the oven (half an hour at least).
I was dubious at first about making chips in the microwave, but after a terrible fail using the oven I thought I'd give it a try.
Rinse a nice sized Russet potato to remove any debris. I left the skin on.
Cut in half and then use a mandoline on ultrathin setting to make 1.5mm slices. For bigger chips from smaller potatoes, cut the potato on an angle when cutting in half. This will result in more oblong chips...great for dipping!
Gently spray a 12 inch plate (not the potatoes) with cooking spray. I used Pam.
Gently rinse the slices and pat dry first to remove some starch for slightly crispier chips.
Place non-overlapping slices around plate starting with the outside, leaving the center area empty (my microwave cooked the center way too fast).
In my microwave a Whirlpool Gold carousel, it took about 6 minutes for the first batch. Add more time if they are not starting to brown or stop early if any are getting too dark.
Careful with the plate when they are done. It will be very hot.
I leave plate in microwave, sliding chips off into a bowl with a fork or knife.
I then place a new batch of slices on plate while it is still in microwave and repeat the process. The cooking time seems to be shorter for successive batches, so adjust time accordingly.
Watch them pretty carefully until you get the hang of it.
I leave plate in microwave
I haven't personally tried this, but there's a recipe for microwave potato chips here:
http://www.thekitchn.com/recipe-recommendation-diy-pota-64078
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21252 | Difference in caffeine levels between light and bold coffee?
Over the last few years I had come to believe that the roasting process for bold coffees removed caffeine from the beans resulting in a lower caffeine content than compared to a light roasted coffee. I got this idea from Good Eats with Alton brown. Here's the clip where the master roaster makes this point.
However, yesterday's On Point w/ Tom Ashbrook had on a coffee expert that made the opposite claim. Also, comments the page have pointed to sources describing the inconsistency of caffeine levels: Caffeine content by roast level and Does dark roast coffee have less caffeine than light roast?
Searching around on .edu sites I find charts that seem to support the idea that bolder coffees contain more caffeine. The charts show smaller amounts of bold coffee (2-4oz) contain the same amount of caffeine as larger amounts of light roasted coffee (6oz). So, obviously, typical consumption amounts play a role in how much caffeine will be ingested.
Caffeine Charts
http://www.uhs.umich.edu/caffeine#contents
http://www.psychiatry.ufl.edu/aec/research/abstracts/sobpcaffiene.pdf
In the end, I'd like a definitive answer to this question: after roasting which bean contains more caffeine or is the difference negligible? And/or does the brewing method significantly alter the caffeine content?
Remember that it's probably also related to the fineness of the grind. More surface area will yield more extraction.
The application of heat and water to your coffee beans/grounds is also a chemical process that alters the caffeine content of the final product. So clearly roasting isn't the "last time caffeine levels are altered via chemistry" (unless you're eating whole coffee beans).
@Flimzy, I clarified my question.
Similar questions: http://cooking.stackexchange.com/q/9573/6498, http://cooking.stackexchange.com/q/1859/6498, http://cooking.stackexchange.com/q/12918/6498,
And a quite different, but related question: http://cooking.stackexchange.com/q/1927/6498
I think you've already found the most definitive sources you're likely to. Unfortunately, definitively answering this would require access to both a coffee roaster and a chemical analytics lab (and a whole lotta free time), so I doubt anyone on SA is equipped to answer it better.
@FuzzyChef, I thought that might be an issue. It was just odd to hear conflicting claims. Thought someone on here might have more knowledge on the subject.
Gumbo, clearly Aaronut's Google-fu is mightier than mine.
I believe that the following study provides a definitive answer:
Application of high performance liquid chromatography to the analysis of some non-volatile coffee components
From the abstract:
High performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) was applied to the analysis of caffeine, trigonelline, nicotinic acid and sucrose in Arabica and Robusta coffee. Green and roasted coffee samples were used in this study and the degradation of sucrose and trigonelline, with the formation of nicotinic acid, was followed during roasting. Caffeine did not undergo significant degradation with only 5.4% being lost under severe roasting.
Roasting does in fact lower the caffeine content, so bolder coffees will have less caffeine if they come from the exact same bean. But even under the worst conditions, the impact of roasting is trivial compared to the impact of bean selection, brewing method, etc.
What does degrade is sucrose (sugar), which is why heavily-roasted beans tend to taste so bitter (or "bold").
Bottom line: Make your roasting decision based on flavour preference, not caffeine content. Because the effect on caffeine is so small, you really can't compare the caffeine content of light roasts vs. dark roasts categorically unless you have a controlled sample, which you don't unless you're working in a lab.
@Ben I think the real answer is what Aaronut said: it doesn't make much difference either way, so get the flavor you want.
Posted from: http://coffeefaq.com/site/node/15 by Daniel Owen:
It really depends on how you measure the caffeine. When coffee is roasted the beans loose some water content (somewhere in the 20% range give or take a few percent). At the same time it is losing weight it is gaining size. This leads to a situation that makes answering this question a little interesting.
Assuming all other variables are the same, if you measure by weight you actually have more caffeine in dark roast because the water loss is faster than the minimal caffeine loss during roasting. If you measure by volume you have less caffeine because the beans expand as they roast. This seems to confuse some people so let me restate the above. If you measure your coffee using a scoop you will have less caffeine per cup using dark roast coffee. If you measure your coffee by weight you will have more caffeine per cup using a dark roast. The difference one way or the other is small. If you are buying a cup of coffee and the coffee is measured by weight (common with prepacked coffee used in many offices and some restaurants) then dark roast will have slightly more caffeine. If you buy a cup and the restaurant measures by volume (common when coffee is fresh ground and measured on the fly) then light roast will be slightly higher in caffeine simply because you will have more coffee grounds. This is really only an issue if you are talking about two identical coffees and even then the differences are small. It is conceivable if you are comparing two available brewed coffees that a difference in varietals between them could make the have as much effect as the roast and the preparation method will almost certainly had a larger effect than the roast level or varietal. If there is a Robusta in one of the coffees it is almost guaranteed to have more caffeine. This is mostly an academic discussion because the differences in caffeine content are relatively small.
Caffeine's boiling point is 352.4F or 178C. Note that it sublimates before its anhydrous (dry) melting point.
Wikipedia's article on coffee roasting, and other hobbyist sources, recommend roasting temperatures upwards of 400F / 200C, so caffeine "loss" is expected.
Of course, strain of bean and other treatment of the coffee/grinds can also affect total caffeine.
The boiling point of caffeine is 315 degrees, and most places don't go anywhere near that (about 260 for our darkest roast), and I've yet to find anywhere that actually goes in to detail as to how the caffeine is "lost" during the roasting process. Aside from that, Danny boy totally has the right idea. Dark roast has significantly less weight per bean, so you should still end up with more caffeine in the dark even if the magical caffeine fairies remove caffeine from the beans before boiling point or decomposition. Grind and extraction methods do matter a great deal. Most commercial coffee houses will be using the same brewers on different roasts of coffee using the same grind for the beans, so for generic brewed coffee dark roast will always have slightly more caffeine.
'I've yet to find anywhere that actually goes in to detail as to how the caffeine is "lost" [...]' Well how about the study referred to in the first sentence of the accepted answer?
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100085 | Safety: Keeping sous-vide cooked chicken in vacuum
My Problem
I have sous-vide cooked some chicken breast, forgot about it, and kept it in the refrigerator for 2 weeks. The chicken breast was thoroughly cooked (63c for 1 hour) and kept in good vacuum.
I have re-cooked it in the sous vide at 63c for and additional 1.5 hour, and finished by frying it in the pan. I am not sure whether it is safe to eat or not.
What Have I Tried
Google Search
Meat and Poultry Charts at foodsafety.gov
Read How long can I store a food in the pantry, refrigerator, or freezer?, but it features general rules, not sous-vide specific ones. I want to know whether sous-vide cooked chicken would last longer.
My Question
For how long can I safely keep cooked, vacuumed and refrigerated chicken breast?
Images
Refrigerated and vacuumed
Recooked and fried
@Halhex for the sake of completeness and for future readers, do you have a link to a reliable source confirming that?
I don't cook meat so I gotta keep studying those chapters somehow
Out of curiosity, how'd it taste?
Tasted a small chuck to be on the safe side. Tasted good, exactly like a fresh one. If I'm feeling well tomorrow morning, I'll have the whole of it for lunch.
Possible duplicate of How long can I store a food in the pantry, refrigerator, or freezer?
The lined answer does not refer to vacuum and sous vide
I originally voted this question as a duplicate. However, the OP is correct in that the proposed duplicate does not address the specific case of sous vide. Here, I attempt to help in that regard.
The definitive source for the answer to your question is Douglas Baldwin. From the information you've supplied, it is difficult to make any safety claims. However, you can compare your product, and your practice, to the points made by Baldwin.
First, sous vide (true sous vide...in a vacuum) can indeed extend shelf life...
IF certain hurdles are cleared.
FIRST, your product is cooked to the pasteurization stage. It is hard to tell how thick your chicken breasts are from the photos. Baldwin has tables that cross reference thickness, temperature, and times so that you can achieve pasteurization. You'll have to compare your practice to this chart to see if you met the threshold. So, once sealed in a vacuum, the first hurdle is to pasteurize your product.
THEN, your product must be cooled as quickly as possible for long term storage. This usually means in an ice bath, then immediately refrigerating or freezing. The method is called "cook-chill." Baldwin cautions, however that "The danger with cook-chill is that pasteurizing does not reduce pathogenic spores to a safe level. If the food is not chilled rapidly enough or is refrigerated for too long, then pathogenic spores can outgrow and multiply to dangerous levels."
Cook-chill, done correctly, greatly reduces the risk from listeria, and spore forming pathogens. However, he goes on to write:
"spores of Clostridium botulinum, C. perfringens, and B. cereus can all survive the mild heat treatment of pasteurization. Therefore, after rapid chilling, the food must either be frozen or held at
below 36.5°F (2.5°C) for up to 90 days,
below 38°F (3.3°C) for less than 31 days,
below 41°F (5°C) for less than 10 days, or
below 44.5°F (7°C) for less than 5 days
to prevent spores of non-proteolytic C. botulinum from outgrowing and producing deadly neurotoxin (Gould, 1999; Peck, 1997)."
I would recommend that you read the PDF.
botulism spores in canned goods cause puffing of the lid ... so I would also say that any swollen packages should be discarded. (and I'd also discard any other packages if it smells or otherwise seems strange)
@Joe...perhaps an obvious sign, but these pathogens can certainly do damage with no visible visuals or smells. So, they shouldn't be relied on as an indicator of safety.
I wasn't trying to imply that. (I debated on putting up a disclaimer) ... just that if you see any of those signs, even if you think you did everything else right, you shouldn't risk it.
@Joe ...and I wasn't suggesting that you were...just clarifying, as some people believe that smells and visual signs are reliable indicators of food safety. I think it is always important to point out that they are not.
Normally it's recommended to keep cooked meat for less than a week in the fridge. But since this was vacuum sealed (less Fat Oxidation and Rancidity) and cooked again at 63c for over an hour (killing bacteria and molds, most of which are harmless but unpleasant, and would be noticable) I'd say it's safe to eat. It might have developed some off-flavors or texture though.
Here's some stuff about it from one of my favourite books, On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen.
As a general rule, leftover meats
are safest when refrigerated or frozen
within two hours of the end of cooking,
and reheated quickly to at least 150oF/65oC
before serving a second time.
To help keep meats safe after cooking:
The development of rancidity in cooked meats can be delayed by minimizing the use of salt, which
encourages fat oxidation, and by using
ingredients with antioxidant activity: for
example the Mediterranean herbs, especially rosemary. Browning the
meat surface in a hot pan also generates
antioxidant molecules that can delay fat
oxidation.
But it might not be good at all.
At the same time
that cooking develops the characteristic flavors of meat, it also promotes chemical
changes that lead to characteristic, stale,
cardboard-like “warmed-over flavors”
when the meat is stored and reheated.
Thanks, but it does not mention durations. The chicken breast was kept (vacuumed and cooked) in the refrigerator for two weeks.
There are a LOT of variables that this question raises.
For me, smell is the important factor. If the chicken smells even slightly "off", it IS off! Chicken is cheap, don't take chances if there is even a hint of there being an issue.
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27254 | Is it safe to keep Carpaccio in a refrigerator for 24 hours?
I have just made some home-made Carpaccio from thinly sliced beef rump, lemon juice, olive oil and Parmigiano.
Is it safe to keep the Carpaccio in the fridge for 24 hours?
It was safe to keep the rump, so why wouldn't it be safe to keep the slices of the rump?
The only way that, according to USDA suggestion, it wouldn't be safe is if, in your preparation, you'd left the raw meat out of refrigeration for longer than two hours. These guidelines are generally conservative, but bacteria can grow quite quickly in meat above 40˚ F (4.5˚ C), and even more quickly above 70˚ (21˚C). Meat that will be served raw should be kept as cold as possible -- chilling your equipment before preparation is often a good idea.
The issue, to my mind, is that it sounds like you've already applied lemon juice. Being acidic, that juice will denature the proteins in the meat, changing its texture -- making it "mushy". (This is why marinades often contain acid; up to a point, this action is perceived as tenderizing.)
There's also likely to be some unpleasant-looking and -tasting, oxidation -- and/or maybe dehydration -- of the thin pieces of meat while they sit in the fridge. This isn't unsafe, but it does decrease the appeal of the beautiful rosy-red raw beef you're supposed to have. Rubbing on some oil may help with this problem, as might plastic wrap directly on the surface.
I'd recommend preparing the meat as close to service as possible and dressing it, at least with the lemon and cheese, at the absolute last moment.
This might go deeper than you suggest. The 2 hours for raw meat assume that it will be cooked afterwards (other foods which are consumed without cooking are not as susceptible to bacteria growth). Second, slices differ from a whole piece of meat: they have much more surface area, and that's where the bacteria live. I don't think the carpaccio is considered safe under the general guidelines; there possibly is some special case so it can be served in restaurants, but I don't have more info on that.
You're suggesting that the slices should be considered unsafe almost immediately after cutting? You're right that surface area is increased, and thus the possibility for contamination, but there's no distinction made in the Food Code between sliced or unsliced raw meat that I can see. The two hour guideline actually seems to be from the USDA: http://www.fsis.usda.gov/FACTSheets/Danger_Zone/index.asp, but I don't see anything there or in the Food Code specifying that the food be cooked. There's got to be some preparation time for any food -- it's impossible for it to be constantly refrigerated.
There's no special cases for restaurants -- indeed, the Food Code specifically applies to commercial food production, and (via adoption by local health departments) has legal force only for them. It mandates that raw food not be served to "highly susceptible populations", be served only upon active customer selection, and with the customer notified that the food is raw or undercooked.
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32705 | When is is necessary to par bake a pie crust?
I am making small pies (in muffin tins!) for a party. I plan on pre-cooking the filling (ground beef and veggies), then finishing the pies at the location. Would it be helpful (either for transport or for shortening the on-location cooking time) to par-bake the pie crusts in the tins?
The reason to par-bake your pie shell is because it would not cook through in the same time that the filling does.
So it depends on what type of filling you are going to use. For example, if you are using a traditional short crust with a cream (custard) filling, the custard will probably cook faster than the crust would, so you would want to par-bake the shell.
On the other hand, for an apple pie with a deep layer of fruit, by the time the fruit is cooked through, the crust usually is too, so par baking is not required.
In your specific example, you have not said what the filling is, that you are precooking. However, if it is essentially fully cooked, you could blind-bake your shells then just put them together to heat through for service. You would need to share more details to get more specific advise.
Does par-baking mean fully cooking the shells, ie "blind baking" as it is called in the UK?
Sorry, you are quite right, I meant to say blind bake in the last bit. Par-baking is partially cooking, blind-baking is fully cooking without the filling.
thanks for the clarification. So you par bake or blind bake depending on the filling and whether/how long it requires cooking.
@GdD Exactly....
Full blind baking is used when the filling isn't cooked at all after being added to the shell
@ElendilTheTall Yes, that is what I was trying to say.
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57322 | Diet coke chicken recipe safe when heating the artificial sweetener contained in the diet coke during the boiling process?
I'm on the Atkins induction week, which means my food choices are limited. One of the recipes I found suggested a recipe which involved Diet Coke chicken. Which basically is boiling chicken in diet coke.
Since I want to try something new, I was all open for the idea, but then I was wondering if it's safe considering you would be heating up the sugar replacement in the diet coke (my case is pepsi max)?
Note that nutrition is off topic here. The question is on-topic as a food safety question, that is, we can tell you (if somebody knows it) whether it can happen that you are delivered in hospital with acute heat-degraded-sweetener poisoning or not. Long-term health effects (for example, if it is a suspected carcinogen) are off topic.
@rumtscho modified the question to focus a bit more on safety and make it more specific
Thank you. Independently of any on- and off-topic considerations, more specific titles are better, they allow others to know at a glance what a question is about. So I like your edit. Else my comment was not meant to make you change the question, just an information so you'd know what information you can get here and what kind we cannot supply, so you can decide whether to look about it elsewhere.
@rumtscho are long term health effects from an ingredient or method that is scientifically accepted to be deleterious (eg, things where governmental or academic institutions recommend you limit consumption to a certain amount) also OT here?
!rackandboneman yes, they are also off topic. The whole "don't eat that because it's bad for you" set of beliefs about food is off topic here, no matter who promotes it - government, scientists, or self-proclaimed gurus. What we allow is the food safety part, as in prevention of infections or cases of poisoning which are potentially traceable to a single meal, and in this case, we want the objective government mandated guidelines of safety and not the personal intuitive decision of "I'd eat it" or "I ate a similar thing and didn't get sick". But RDAs are OT.
I don't believe heating regular coke is safe, either, honestly. Coke, or any soft drink, is quite a complicated mixture. It will be really nice to have the manufacture's guarantee that the current and future ingredient will not degrade into toxins when heated to a certain temperature. One of my concerns is the acid in the coke could corrode the cookware and dissolve some metal into the food.
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22405 | Is there any trick to make a palindrome-cocktail?
I'm trying to make a palindrome cocktail:
made by building the components, like for example the classic B52; and also
having the same ingredients going from top to bottom as it has going from bottom to top.
At first I thought it was surface tension that separated the layers of a built cocktail. However, it seems it is density that determines where a particular component will go. One of the resources on density I found was this spirits density chart. Now, of course: no particular spirit is found twice on that chart! This makes the palindrome cocktail quite a challenge.
The Question: Are there any products, tricks or techniques available to separate layers in a built cocktail without relying on density?
Some brainstorm-ideas I came up with but have no faith (yet) in trying:
Separate layers with a sort-off crême-brûlée-style crust. However this will most not seall off completely on the edges, plus I risk setting the spirits on fire.
Use some kind of gelatine product?
As a side note, even though my question is about a true palindrome drink (with the exact same spirits top-down as bottom-up), if there are no real tricks, I'd also be interested to see some added suggestions on a "fake" palindrome where it's just "looks" like a palindrome (color/transparancy wise). I tried this, but given the above density chart that felt as a hard-enough challenge in itself.
Logged attempts
I'll update this section as I experiment with provided answers (but the question above won't change, of course).
A Cointreau + Baileys + butterscotch liquor. An attempt to make a color-based palindrome (a cheat!), but the colors are obviously not similar enough.
B Dark Rum + Cointreau + Dark Rum. The bottom dark rum was mixed with gomme syrup and even more sugar (as much as would dissolve) to make it sink to the bottom. Based on this answer below. Still have to work on color though.
J1 Cherry-butterscotch-jello + lemon liquor + cherry-butterscotch-jello. The top jello kind-of sunk inside the middle melon layer.
J2 Cherry-butterscotch-jello + lemon liquor + cherry-butterscotch-jello. Same as J1, only more careful sliding the top jello in on the back of a spoon.
J3, the proof of concept! Melon-liquor + cherry-butterscotch-jello + melon liquor. First I put the bottom liquor in the freezer, then the jello on top (wiggle it in place), then more liquor on top, and wait a few minutes for the bottom layer to melt.
Footnote
Although I'd accept any tricks that allow a basic palindrome-cocktail, I'd be extra happy if they allow for palindromes above 3 layers (so 5 layers and up).
Are you sure it's possible? I did a quick web search but nothing came up, except this: http://www.twitpic.com/79w0cy and I don't even know what the ingredients are. Or is it something you thought of yourself?
It's a challenge we made up ourselves. This is what happens if you let nerds think of cocktails, I'm afraid :D. So I'm not sure if it's possible (though my gut feeling says "yes", there should be at least some kind of molecular gastronomy trick to do this?). Anyways, if no answer turns up at all then I'd accept "Nope" as the answer to my question ='(
Well, I certainly think that there is a way to make a fake palindrome cocktail. But I also want to know if a true one would be possible. It's intriguing.
You could, of course, create gel layers, and the determining factor in stability would be the firmness of those gels. However - and I suppose this is just a hunch - I seriously doubt that a gel firm enough to hold the weight of all the heavier layers above it (and you are asking for at least 3) would really be drinkable, unless you're aiming for the consistency of a "Jello shot".
A better idea, in my opinion, would be to simply change the densities of certain layers, and an effective (and tasty) way to do that is with sugar, or more accurately, sugar syrup. There's a type of syrup used in bartending called Gomme Syrup, which is a thick sugar syrup with Gum Arabic added to prevent crystallization (among other things).
Sugar, by itself, has very poor solubility in alcohol, but sugar syrups and gomme syrup in particular will have few problems, considering that's already how many mixed drinks are made (like Whiskey Sour). If you're feeling really adventurous, you could also use sugar alcohols such as sorbitol or xylitol, which dissolve readily in ethyl alcohol in solid form. However, these are much more potent (sweetness-wise) than sucrose and some people report gastrointestinal reactions, so use at your own risk.
Sugar syrups are very dense, so if you mix them thoroughly with a particular spirit, you'll end up with a heavier (and sweeter) version of that spirit. So to make your palindrome, start with what you'd normally put at the top (say GM for the B52), mix it with syrup (it shouldn't take an excessive amount - maybe 20-30% by volume, but you'll have to experiment), and layer that on the bottom. Then take the next-lightest, mix it with slightly less syrup, and continue. Once you reach what would normally be the densest liquid, layer the drink as normal up to the top with the "pure" spirits.
The more layers, the more math you'll have to do, because you'll need to make sure that you add just enough syrup to layer 2 so that it's lighter than layer 1 (bottom) but still heavier than layer 3, and so on. Unless you're prepared to make the drink very sweet, you'll need to be fairly precise in your calculations.
Disclaimer: I haven't yet tried this myself, as it's the first I've heard of anyone trying to do this. However, I see no reason why it wouldn't work with proper (careful) layering technique. In fact, I remember doing something very similar all the way back in primary school, called rainbow in a glass.
Thx, I'll be sure to try the gomme syrup suggestion later tonight. It's use is a wee bit limited to spirits that are transparent, otherwise the gomme syrup would change the color/transparency for the bottom version of the spirit. But I guess two layers of cointreau divided by something with color is a great start!
@Jeroen: I don't think you'll find that it changes the colour all that much in the ratio being suggested here - and if it does, there are ways to change the colour as well (food colouring, heavy cream, etc.) Besides which, it's being a little anal-retentive; first get the concept and technique nailed down, then worry about finesse.
To get a "drinkable gel", you're looking for a thixotropic gel. Serve carefully ;) as shaking will liquify it.
Didn't get around to the jelly (nor the thixotropic gel :O) yet, but I did have a go with gomme syrup (see the updated "attempts" section in the question). It looks like I'll be accepting this answer after a few more practice tries, when I can get the coloring right.
@Jeroen: Looking good. If you care more about appearance than taste, you might just try mixing the top layers with the same amount of water as you did for the bottom layers with syrup. Water will change the density very little and should be fine on its own, or, you could concoct a sugar/gomme syrup with the same density as the alcohols themselves in order to change the colour without changing the density at all, if you find that it's too sensitive to pure water.
Got around to trying your jello-suggestion (see logged attempts in the question). I had to freeze the bottom layer first to get the middle-jello-layer in place, but after that it worked like a charm! Answer accepted.
Two approaches come to mind. In both cases, the idea is to stop insisting that the ingredients stay exactly the same in both positions (bottom and top), but instead to make them appear the same. Consider a cocktail that looks like (from bottom to top) A-B-C-B-A. Two ways to accomplish that are:
Use different ingredients on the bottom and top. So your cocktail construction is really A-B-C-D-E. B and D should be the same color, but B should of course have a higher density than C, D, or E. Similarly, A and E should also be the same color but different densities.
Start the same ingredients for corresponding positions, but alter them to change their densities. So, your A-B-C-B-A cocktail is really A1-B1-C-B2-A2, where A1 and A2 are the same spirit, but you've added a lot of sugar or something like that to the base A.
I like your suggestion, it was my first idea for a workaround as well. But do you have any suggestions for actual spirits to use in the first, "fake" A-B-C-D-E variant? I had a very hard time finding spirits with the same color/transparency but different densities.
Try using food coloring to make one of the liquors match the color of the other one. For example, rum & vodka, then use a different color in the middle.
Though impractical, brine from the ocean sometimes drops to the bottom of the sea floor and refuses to mix with the rest of the ocean. If taste wasn't an issue, you could make one super-saturated with salt so it sinks.
Also, vary the temperatures of the same liquor, so the colder batch sinks. If you freeze it to near it's freezing point, perhaps with liquid nitrogen or dry ice, and keep another batch near the boiling point, perhaps in an oven, then they would not mix readily. You'd have to gently spoon it into the glass.
A combination of the above will also work.
You're saying a near-frozen liquor and a near-boiling liquor can be built? Wouldn't the temperatures equalize very quickly?
The food coloring suggestion is interesting though, seems like an easy way to do it. This would probably work best with transparent liquor, no? If so, do you have any suggestions for what liquor to use? I found that transparent liquors all have similar denisities.
I think that in theory, the near-frozen and near-boiling can work if there is another, temperate layer between them - but then you are left with finding a second liqueur whose room-temp density falls in the very slim margin between liq.1 frozen and liq2.boiling. And drink right away. Oh, and not get any of the taste, due to your mouth being subjected to extreme temperatures from both ranges of the acceptable spectrum (or beyond) at once. All in all, not a plan I would try executing.
I also thought of another idea. Pour 1/3 liquor 1 into a glass, cover with 1/4" of water. Freeze the glass & water to form an ice barrier. Pour liquor 2 on top of ice. Pour liquor 1 on top of liquor 2. Voilá! This can also be repeated to layers 5, 7, etc. Use thicker ice at bottom than top, so as patron drinks, the ice melts by the time they get to that portion.
I have an idea! : )
Make some thin gel cups out of sodium alginate.
Put a gel cup inside your cylindrical glass then fill with the alcohol that you want. Then put a cup on top of that and fill that gel cup with a different alcohol. And then one on top of that and so on...
Then serve it with a straw so the straw can pierce through the gel cups and you can get to the layers that you want.
I think you can even flavor the gel cups with different flavors if you want to be fancy!
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88121 | Official cocktail recipes vs typical glass sizes
I've bought and tried various types of glassware for cocktails. Glasses for typical shaken drinks include a cheap martini glass (165 ml), a nick and nora style glass and a coupe (125 ml), among others. This matches with sizes found in shops around the web, where they might even go higher in volume.
However, the basic recipes for cocktails tend to end up a lot smaller, to the point where it looks silly in a glass. For example the "IBA Official" Aviation Cocktail calls for 75 ml of spirits and juices, and shaking over ice (using 30mm square solid cubes, about 5 to 6) will not dilute it to 125 let alone 165 ml of fluids.
Obviously I can just scale up ingredients proportionally. But given that "typical" cocktail glasses don't match up with "typical" cocktail recipes, I feel like I'm making a mistake.
So my question is: how do you go from a typical cocktail recipe (with around 75 ml of ingredients) to a typical 125-165 ml final product?
In my examples above the sizes are for the liquids, assuming around 10% of leeway. So for example the martini glass is 165 ml, but around 180 ml when filled up completely.
This might be a better fit on https://alcohol.stackexchange.com/
Yes, this would of course be on topic on Alcohol, but it it's perfectly on topic here and already well-answered, so no need to worry about going elsewhere.
Despite what many bars, convenience stores, and fast food restaurants would have you believe, drink glasses are not intended to be "filled to the brim" (or even close). This is particularly true of cocktails and other spirits. The 'head space' allows the drinker to swirl (or, if they have had a few, 'slosh') the drink around to remix the cocktail ingredients as they seek the bottom of the glass. Any water that has melted into the drink will be diluted into the mix, and the drink may be more directly exposed to any remaining ice in order to chill the liquid just as it is consumed. Thus, the 'standard glass' has been designed to exceed the standard drink. Of course, always wanting 'as much as we can get' people tend to expect their neat scotch to be filled to the brim...just like the self-serve uber-drink from the local gas station.
In the absence of an official rule book for pouring drinks into glasses I can offer some references you might look to, including the fact that a Google Image search of "Full Cocktail Glass" almost universally shows images of drinks with significant air on top. Commentaries from self-appointed experts at the bar as well as amateurs chiming in with their thoughts tend to corroborate this view. For my part, if more than two members of the family say the word "reunion", Jack Daniels stock jumps five points...so I can at least pretend expertise...
Even a beer glass (a pilsner) is designed to make room for a head on the 'proper' serving.
Thx for your insights. I shouldv'e mentioned my glassware volumes already excluded 'head space' (e.g. my Nick and Nora Glass is 125 ml but 160ml filled to the brim). So the Aviation only fills it for 50%, leaving a lot more 'head space' than probably intended?
Minor additional point on "sloshing": the waiter or bartender also needs to be able to carry the drink to the customer without spilling a third of it. Not a great experience to watch several sips' worth of your drink end up on the floor or table as it's delivered.
@Jeroen: you might want to edit your question to clarify that the sizes you gave already account for head space.
@Marti Aye, was trying to think of a way to add it, good point. I've added it merely as a footnote, because this answer has attracted many upvotes and is thus considered useful by the community (and I didn't want to 'invalidate' it by changing my question at this stage too much). - This also means that I won't be accepting this as my specific answer, though it is still certainly helpful and possibly a solution for others interested in this particular issue.
People's understanding of what "one" cocktail is have varied over the years. See for example this article, which, fittingly enough, discusses nick and nora glasses.
glasses were a lot smaller back then (2 ounces or thereabouts)
The trend towards larger drink sizes has been consistent over the 20th century for both alcoholic and nonalcoholic drinks. I won't go into idle speculation why it happened, but it shows that sizes are not really fixed. I wouldn't be surprised if the standards body of a professional society tries to deviate less from tradition and prescribes smaller sizes than the ones which are commonly used nowadays, while glassware manufacturers' marketing departments go with the trends or even lead/create them.
This is just one factor leading to the discrepancy, there probably are more like Cos Callis' answer shows.
The same point (6 ounces now, 2 ounces then) plus a picture for those who don't know what a Nick and Nora glass is: http://www.newyorkfirst.com/gifts/nick--nora-martini-glasses-427/
Glasses come in all sizes. Desired drink size come in all sizes. I would not worry about that.
Obviously the answer is to scale up. You are not going to go from 75 ml to 125 ml without scaling.
It is easier to scale up than down.
On that recipe:
4.5 cl Gin
1.5 cl Maraschino
1.5 cl Fresh lemon juice
Just think of it as
3 parts Gin
1 part Maraschino
1 part Fresh lemon juice
That is 5 parts. Chose the part size to get what you want. If you use a 1 oz jigger you get 5 oz which is about 150 ml.
In the US common jigger sizes are 1/2 oz, 1 oz, and 1.5 oz.
Margarita:
2 oz Tequila
1 oz Lime juice
1 oz Cointreau
4 oz is kind of small. Does not mean that is the intended size. It is just the ratio. If you want a bigger glass use a 1.5 oz jigger. Even bigger use 1 oz and just double everything. I you want a pitcher use 1 cup as a jigger.
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23979 | How do big companies make sure their product always looks and tastes the same?
When professional bakeries or companies such as Dunkin' Donuts or Panos create their dishes, how do they make sure the end product has the same look and taste as always?
Do they just premake huge volumes of the dough, and let the establishment simply pour the stuff into a shape (e.g. muffins) so they always deliver the same muffin to the customer?
If so, what machines do they use for it, as opposed to amateur cooking to always use the same amount of grams of each ingredient, and the way it is mixed, etc?
Stuff in chain bakeries isn't made on the spot, it is industrially produced (not just the dough, but the loaves). They may leave a final step of ready-baking the almost-baked loaves so you can get your bread hot at the local franchise. Here a video of industrial bread production (supermarket bread, not bakery bread): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KS6b9WbHgoE&feature=related. Or did you mean to ask something else?
If you can get Netflix Instant watch, there are several episodes of How Its Made that show how its done. Or I guess if you can get the show elsewhere, that works too.
how do they make sure the end product has the same look and taste as always?
This is the realm of quality control. It involves such activities as:
developing processes that are as consistent as possible
measuring the product against a standard
identifying and eliminating sources of variation
It's easier to control a single large-scale process in a factory than small processes duplicated at many locations, so as much as possible they'll deliver pre-mixed, pre-measured ingredients to retail locations. Equipment will be standardized and automated at each location. A recipe then becomes very hard to screw up, something like:
Add one sack of standard donut mix, one container of eggs, and one
bucket of water to the mixer. Press the "Mix-2" button. When the mixer
stops, transfer dough to sheeter/former and press the green button...
Disclaimer: I've never worked in a franchise donut shop, and actual recipes may be more or less complicated than the made-up one above. But that's the general idea, and it's deployed widely in manufacturing whether or not the product is food.
You can do some of the same things at home if you want to simplify a recipe that you make frequently.
The easiest way to get started is to measure ingredients by weight (if you don't already). It's a lot faster and easier to make, say, a bread recipe if you can skip the measuring cups and just pour flour into the mixing bowl until you reach the target weight. Repeat with water, yeast, salt, etc. You don't dirty any measuring cups, you'll get more consistent results, and you'll save time.
Another step in that direction is to pre-mix whatever ingredients you can, so that you can make a big batch of mix once in a while and then measure out just one thing instead of four or five each time you make the recipe. Pre-mixing can reduce the shelf life of the ingredients, though, so it's not always idea. If you can't pre-mix, then you can at least pre-measure ingredients, or use measuring tools that are suited to the quantities that you need. For example, if you make bread daily using 24oz. of flour, you might get a 12oz. scoop and pre-measure the salt and instant yeast into small containers. Then your recipe is something like:
Add two scoops of flour, a container of salt, a container of yeast,
and a pint of water to the mixer...
Of course, one of the nice things about home cooking is that it's not exactly the same every time. Who wants to eat the same thing every day?
Having worked for Mrs. Fields once upon a time, this is spot-on. White chocolate macademia cookies? 15lbs flour, 5lbs sugar, 3#nuts, 3#chips, and one bag mix #4 (no, we never were told was was in mix #4, and I don't think I wanted to know). Measuring by weight and using premix ingredients and large quantities produces a very consistent result.
These companies use recipes that were adjusted for industrial fabrication. Most of the times, they also don't measure by hand. As soon as a recipe goes into productions, the machines are programmed to weight and mix everything. Also, the delivered goods must go through a laboratory quality check. After production, there is always another quality check.
Is is not unusual that these companies have their own machines build for use in franchise-restaurants. Often the stuff is delivered deep-frozen to the restaurant and the final product is only assembled there. A good example of this is McDonalds: They have strict guides how to assemble every burger - Google it if you want to know them.
Uniformed quality and apperance of industrial baked products (toast, bread, donuts, rolls, etc.) relys strictly on usage of specilized mixes, pre-mixes and other ingredients which provides stability and safe results. Ingredients of those products are: enzymes, emulsifiers, stablyzers, various agents, etc. This is the only way to secure stabile and constant quality on a big scale because flour is natural product and its quality varies. Wetiher we like it or not, this is how it works.
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68928 | English name for cut of meat (Cacho de Paleta)
I was given a cut of meat that I am unfamiliar with. I was told the Spanish name is Cacho de Paleta. I'm not sure how to prepare it, and was hoping to find some recipes and preparation tips online. To do that, I was hoping someone could tell me the English name for this cut of meat, so that I can search for it online.
The cut appears to come from the upper leg of the cow (the shank, perhaps?). You can see a picture and a diagram of the section of the cow it comes from here.
What is the English name for this cut?
It might be easier to come up with an analogous cut name if you explain what these cuts are like and what they're used for. Note that butchery around the world makes for a varied usage of meat and some cuts simply don't exist across cultural borders.
Also, it might be better if we break this into two questions, one for each cut of meat.
@Catija: That is part of the problem. I don't know what the cuts are used for, I'm trying to find that out online, but to do that I need to know what it is called in English
So do you not speak Spanish? Often we get these questions from people who have moved from home and are trying to find a product they used to get.
Ah, the additional background helps explain a lot! Thanks for adding it.
Cacho de paleta means "hunk of blade" as far as I can tell, however blade comes from the shoulder and that doesn't look the right shape for a shoulder cut. It looks more like leg to me, in the US that would be called shank and in the UK it would be shin if the front leg and leg if it's from the back leg.
Whether it's shoulder or leg meat preparation is similar as both are working cuts with lots of collagen. Roasting is out - you won't get the collagen breaking down and the lack of fat will mean a tough, dry result. Use a long, slow and wet method like stewing or better yet braising. Put it in the oven at 120C for 4 hours with a cup of water and a cup of red wine in a covered pot as a basic preparation method.
I don't speak the language but this website gives the impression it's from the backleg: http://montecillos.com/producto/cacho-de-paleta/
According to the Cátedra de Anatomía Animal de la Escuela de Medicina Veterinaria, de la Universidad Nacional de Costa Rica (Chair of Animal Anatomy of the School of Veterinary Medicine, of the National University of Costa Rica), in this video on their youtube channel, Cacho de Paleta is called "Chuck Tender" in the USA.
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22705 | Why is freshly-chopped garlic sticky?
When chopping garlic the blade of my knife, and any fingers used to handle the garlic, become sticky.
What causes this reaction?
Is there any way to counteract it?
EDIT: After trying both suggestions out on my own, olive oil worked best for me. This feels very much like a results may vary situation, so I encourage anyone curious to try both ways.
Garlic juice is supposed to be sticky, that's how you get the gold leaf to stick to the parchment! :)
I can't answer the Why that others have answered so well, but when I chop garlic I just dribble some water on them. It prevents the stickiness without adding oil, salt, etc.
Garlic is full of sticky (and tasty) oils, which is what makes it stick to your knife and fingers.
Dipping your fingers in olive oil and carefully rubbing them on the flat of the knife blade should prevent the garlic sticking.
Hm, are you sure it's oil? It washes off easily with water, and wetting the knife with water prevents sticking too.
Not to mention that oil generally doesn't cause sticking, it prevents it. I might guess that it has to do with fructooligosaccharides, a naturally-occurring sugar in garlic.
+1 for fructooligosaccharides. Did you comment just so you could type that, @Aaronut? :)
When crushed or chopped, garlic releases mercaptins from within its cells (sulfur containing compounds). Sulfur readily forms bonds with other amino acids, notably cystine which itself contains a sulfur atom in its chemical structure. When two sulfhydryl groups (S-H) come into close proximity, a disulfide bridge can be formed, creating a relatively strong chemical bond between the two molecules. This chemical attraction between the proteins in you skin and the garlic compounds causes the sensation of stickiness, much like hydrolyzed sugar sticking to your skin. Since lipids (oils) have a stronger attraction to the oils that coat your skin, they displace the sulfurs and prevent your hands from being sticky.
When garlic is roasted, the proteins within are denatured (lose their function) and lead to a milder taste and less sticky chemicals.
Really informative and useful first post. Welcome to the site.
You can prevent it from sticking by wetting the knife - just quickly run water over it on each side.
I'm fairly certain that Aaronut's right that it's a sugar (what else would it be?) but I don't know for sure. I'll update my answer if I can confirm it!
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34254 | Estimating the fat content of homemade chicken foot gelatin
I recently simmered a pot of chicken feet (including skin) for the first time and made an astonishingly gelatinous gelatin. It's clearly suffused with chicken fat, but I have no idea how much -- I don't think I could guess the fat % by weight or the fat:protein ratio to within a factor of 10.
I tried melting some in a tall, narrow container and letting the fat settle on top, but that was unsuccessful because 1) the gelatin fraction solidified at room temperature, and 2) some of the fat appears to be emulsified and won't separate out on its own. So, consider this a food chemistry thought experiment: Given a sample of gelatin with fat in it, how would you estimate the fat content?
Responses to some likely questions:
1) If I wanted a homogeneous, clean-looking and -tasting product I definitely should have removed the skin. This was more of a nose-to-tail-eating experiment.
2) I know a little chicken fat won't kill me. But I'm doing nutritional tracking to investigate some health issues, so a rough estimate would be useful.
http://www.molecularrecipes.com/techniques/gelatin-filtered-consomme-gelatin-filtration/
@TFD Thanks, that's fascinating. But it looks like that would remove the water, leaving a mix of gelatin and fat. I'd want a method to remove just the fat or, failing that, just the gelatin.
From experience with gelatinous stock from pig bits, I've found that gelatine can seem fatty, when really it's not - and gelatine is good for you in ways that fat is not.
I think your tall, narrow container idea is a good one, but first get it up to liquid temperature, and then keep it at that temperature for as long as it takes. You'll want to avoid convention currents, so take it off any direct heat. It might be enough to wrap it in a towel, or maybe you'll need to leave it in an airing cupboard or even a low oven.
Given long enough, even the emulsified component should separate out - although I can't guess whether that would be hours, days or weeks!
This does mean leaving the stock at a bacteriologically unsafe temperature for a long period - so the stock you test in this way should not be eaten. Do it on a small sample.
Thanks for the suggestion! And I definitely understand that the analytic sample is a sacrifice in the name of science (:
We are avid eaters of chicken feet and there is very little fat in the feet ... the fat does all go to the top because fat always goes to the top weather it is hot or not so whatever fat is at the top is all the fat there is. We make a big 5 gallon pot and the only fat we get out of it is probably 1 or 2 millimeters. And that’s with probably 30 feet. And the benefits of the heath very much outweigh the tiny amount of fat
You could just use information from the USDA nutritional guide as represented here.*
*Source: Nutrient data for this listing was provided by USDA SR-21.
It's about a 1:1 fat to protein by mass, approx 3:2 fat:protein by nutrition (caloric).
In general, I don't think the extent of fat suspended in an emulsification is limited by anything. Watch Heston beat a virtually impossible amount of oil into a mayonnaise. Because of that, you can't impose any limitations on how much fat could be in there.
I saw that USDA entry but I'm not clear on whether that's the gelatin, or the meat / skin on the feet themselves.
Or you may refrigerate only the stock from the cooked chicken legs for as long as it takes for the fat to come to the surface. What remains is your gelatin.
OP states that the gelatin solidifies too soon, before the fat rises to the top?
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58549 | Quantities of lactose, lactic acid, and other metabolites in yogurt
It's common to see vague statements about how people with limited lactose tolerance may be able to eat yogurt, because the bacterial fermentation eliminates some of the lactose. However, I haven't been able to find any quantitative information on how much lactose remains. I'm sure it varies widely with different cultures and methods, but I'd love to have even a few specific examples where someone fermented some yogurt and assayed it for lactose.
Similarly, I'd like to know how much of the lactose ends up in the form of lactic acid vs. glucose and galactose monosaccharides vs. other metabolites. This seems potentially important in terms of predicting the caloric content and metabolic effects of yogurt (e.g., blood glucose response).
I've done some searches on the web and in the scientific literature, but I haven't been able to find information on the carbohydrate composition of yogurt or other fermented foods. Can anyone point me to a source?
The following is quoted from this site:
If you're lactose intolerant and looking for yogurt, go Greek. Greek yogurt, which is thicker because much of the whey, the watery part of milk, has been strained out in processing. This also removes much of the lactose. Greek yogurt supplies less than 6.8 grams of lactose per 6-ounce serving, compared to less than 8.5 grams in whole-fat yogurt or 14 grams in non-fat yogurt. Hard cheeses such as cheddar have even less lactose, between 0 to 2 grams per ounce. Milk, in comparison, has approximately 11 grams in one cup.
(Emphasis added.)
Also note that probiotic yogurt (ie: with the cultures still living intact) has the additional benefit of breaking down lactose in the gut where there is a lactase deficiency. See here.
Sorry I don't have more specific info on other metabolites at this stage.
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91464 | Name for turning ingredients to powder / mush, and then molding back into their original shape
Is there a name for the technique of turning an ingredient into a homogeneous mass, and then molding it back into its original shape, or the shape of a less-processed form of that ingredient? Examples:
Pringles are made by turning potatoes (and some wheat) into powder, and then molding them back into a shape of a potato that was sliced up and fried.
The McRib consists of homogeneous meat that's been shaped to resemble a more natural configuration of meat.
Harvest Snaps are peas that have been turned to powder and then pressed back into the shape of a fresh pea pod.
Bonus Question: All the examples I can think of are industrially processed food. Are there any traditional or home recipes that use a similar technique?
Reformed
This is most often used to describe meat products such as "reformed ham" or "reformed scampi". You can occasionally see onion rings made with chopped onion described as reformed, e.g. here.
Pringles could be described as "reformed potato snacks" for example. Pringles are less than half potato though, so that may not be entirely accurate.
As for doing this at home, it's common to bake a potato, scoop the potato from the skin, mash it up with some seasonings and then put it back in the skin, thereby reforming the potato.
The relatively new term of Molecular Gastronomy, I think would apply, though my saying so I am sure would cause practitioners to cringe.
MG is the aspect of food science which studies the physical and chemical transforming of food to study effects on flavor and form. The term is normally applied to the mad scientists of the kitchen, like Hester Blumenthal, though he says that he hates the term because he think it makes such techniques seem more complicated than they are, and I agree to him to the point that I think it applies to the more commercial forms that you asked about. The term is generally applied to things like spherification. But look at that as an example, Blumenthal will do things like take peas, puree them and create a concentration, and then spherify it back into something that looks like a pea again but with stronger flavor. Is this different that taking a potato, grinding, drying, enhancing the color, and reforming it into a uniform packaged shape? To me, same practice, just at an industrial and different quality level.
The term encompassed the entire field of studying subtle effects in temperature, texture, shape and form, and was coined to apply more to high end, showmanship presentations I think, but really is applicable to the whole field of physically or chemical re-engineering the look and feel of food item.
Really interesting, thank you! I don't think MG is the term I'm looking for because it's so much broader than this, but the pea example is great and I hadn't been aware that MG also used this technique.
@octern Probably too broad, I agree. It encompasses, or at least I think it should, the area, but other aspects of food manipulations as well. It is a relatively recently coined term and that adds to my feeling of a general absence of well know culinary specific terms rather than general terms for techniques like extruded, reformed, etc. Of course I also tend to think of a old Wendy's restaurant anti-chicken nugget commercial in the US from the 80's: "Parts is parts".
"Extruded" is used to describe the end product in some cases. This is the process of forcing soft material through a nozzle to give it shape (whether that's hot aluminium or potato).
At home, piping is closest. Piping mashed potato is a bit fancy for me but could certainly be done. Making sausages is very similar, though of course they're forced into a casing. If you start with a steak, mince it and form it into a burger you're doing something quite similar, but extrude doesn't apply there.
Thanks! Extruding is a good term to add to this discussion, though I don't think it's exactly what I'm looking for because it doesn't imply a particularly food-like shape.
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41985 | How to dry fruit peels without growing mold?
I'm trying to dry citrus peels in a jar (I don't want to leave them indefinitely on the counter) without much luck. Any suggestions?
You can't close them up and expect them to stay mold-free, they will produce too much humidity.
You will have to spread the peels on a flat surface, without overlapping. Do it on a slightly absorptive surface, and breathable is good too. The optimal setting would be a wire rack with a sheet of paper on it, but if you don't have a rack to commit to the task, skip the breathable part and use a large plate.
While you can't have them conveniently stuffed in a jar, they are not so hard to get dried. Just don't use prime real estate such as the kitchen counter. Find a convenient, undisturbed wide place - the top of a cabinet works, if you put something above them to keep the dust out. Or maybe you have some surface which is flat, but too low to be used for anything else. As long as there is free air flow, there is no problem of having something close above them.
Or, as tM-- suggested, use a quick drying method. Both an oven and a dehydrator should work. You will get a slightly better taste with slow air-drying, but the difference may be too small to notice.
Once the drying is completed, the peels can easily be stored in a jar without catching mold.
I've successfully dried peels in the oven at low/minimum temperature (150/200F for several hours) - although this is sort of imprecise. Just check them every half hour or so, and take them out of the oven when they are no longer pliable/bendable and make a hard sound when you tap them.
Some ovens have a plate warming setting that is really good for this. I've dried coconut flesh in the oven. Since it's so much more moist it took about 4-6 hours for the couple of times I did it. Citrus peels have less moisture and would take less time. You could also do a combination of the two suggestions here. I would start with the oven and then move to an undisturbed space. The oven can pull a lot of moisture quickly because of the dry heat. If you want to preserve some flavor then take the peels out and let them air dry.
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22999 | How to make crumbly cookies?
I am trying to make alfajores, following this recipe. What steps should I take to make them more crumbly?
What is your recipe?
I believe alfajores are quite different from country to country, so I don't think anyone can even hope to answer without you posting your recipe.
Describe what you mean by crumbly? Would you like the cookie to break up into pieces when you bite it OR would you like it be very flaky so you could scratch it and leave a pile of dust?
The former; it should offer little resistance when bit.
You want to minimize gluten formation, like in making pastry. So, use a low-gluten (pastry) flour. That recipe uses cornstarch alongside flour, which makes sense. You also want to, as much as possible, minimize water and coat the starch granules with fat. So, you might try spinning the flour and fat in a food processor before mixing in the wet ingredients. Definitely use the brandy -- same idea as vodka in a pie crust which helps to prevent gluten formation!
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95112 | Christmas-ifying seafood linguine
How would you modify seafood linguine to give it a holiday twist? I am cooking and some of my conservative guests are in shock after hearing the menu. How can I mollify them?
I'm no professional, but if you'd like to give it a holiday twist, maybe add some candy cane bits inside? If it won't go well, you can always serve a side meal that is originally "Christmas-ified".
Dress the seafood wirh santa costumes
I don't understand what would be shocking about seafood linguine, nor why it is not seen as "seasonal." Unless there are health concerns, give them some strong egg nog, and make the best damn seafood linguini you can.
but think twice before putting candy cane bits in.
These complaints are truly bizarre, IMO. Pasta and seafood is literally a Christmas Eve classic — definitely an Italian-American tradition, at the very least.
Make it a red&green linguini?
There are a number of ways to color pasta, or sauce - some might be natural, some might be commercially available. Like using spinach and tomato flavored past, or one could use food dye, or modify the sauce recipe (which can start out ranging from marinara red to pesto green to white sauce, depending on recipe), or add or modify toppings (flakes of red n green bell peppers, or tomato or broccoli, etc).
It might even work with just one modification, ie, green and white, red and white, green and red, are all Christmas-ish color combos.
I don't know what your recipe is, or what colors might already be present (based on ingredients, etc) but it might not be too tricky a change with a bit of planning.
You could use fresh chopped green herbs and some minced red pepper as a Christmas color themed garnish.
We might need to know where you live & what you can get hold of at the last minute.
I'd say if you live inside 45° of the Equator, or South of it - ie, it's likely to be warm even if not actually sunny, you could possibly get away with some quick last-minute trimmings - a holly leaf, a gingerbread reindeer... anything you can find at the local supermarket.
If you live North of that, anywhere people wouldn't consider snow at Xmas to be outside the realms of possibility (even if it only actually happens once a decade) the I think you may have mistaken the word 'conservative' for 'traditional' & have an uphill struggle, which I'm tempted to think could only be cured by turning your linguine into a starter & setting up something with at least a sprout, a carrot & hopefully some kind of potato next to it for main.
At worst, grab a slice of turkey breast & turn it into turkey & seafood linguine.
The linguine was indeed a starter, and I should have said 'traditional'.
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23154 | 36 inch by 36 inch counter depth refrigrator
I wanna buy a fridge with 36 inch depth, 36 inch width and any height. The main feature I need is I want it to be flushed by the kitchen cabinets (like subzero). Is there any brand except wolf I could check?
Thanx
Please refer to our equipment tag wiki for an explanation of what types of equipment/appliance questions are on topic. Neither brand recommendations nor installation questions are considered culinary topics here.
Most of the major manufactures make counter-depth models. Here is a selection of models sold by Best Buy - GE, KitchenAid, Samsung, Frigidaire, Bosch, Electrolux, and Whirlpool are all represented.
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24002 | In how much water do I need to put ramekins when cooking au bain marie in the oven?
I have been given four ramekins and a cooking book with 30 recipes for eggs in a ramekin as a present.
Everything is explained very clearly:
Preheat the water for the bain marie dish in the oven at (I think) 180°C
Put the eggs in a ramekin
Add other ingredients
Place the ramekin in the bain marie dish in the oven
Get the ramekins out when you see the egg white is starting to coagulate
I have never used ramekins and I have never cooked au bain marie in the oven, but I believe the amount of water you use is pretty important. Unfortunately the book doesn't mention this.
So how high should the water level be for the ramekins?
Ideally, the water level should be just as, or a bit above, the egg level. So, you fill the ramekin to maybe 1.5 cm below the rim, place it in the dish, and fill the dish until it is 1 cm below the ramekin rim. You can deviate a bit, if you must - if you had a bit too much custard and filled the ramekins more, you shouldn't get the water too high, because you don't want to get water splashed onto the custard if it should start boiling (actually, you want to avoid a roiling boil in your bain marie, but it can happen). Even if the egg is slightly higher than the water, it will still be OK. If you have the water level too low, you risk to overheat the upper portions of your custards.
This assumes the souffle-cup-like ramekins usually sold to home bakers. If you have very flat ones, like crema catalana dishes, it gets more complicated. You have to have the water close to the rim, and bake at lower settings. It can help to put them high in the bain marie, e.g. on a cake cooling rack, so that they are cooled from below rather than the sides.
Do you mean the water is actually used to cool the eggs a bit? I always thought it helped everything heat up faster. The book says I need to use hot water. Should I be doing this then? If the water should prevent overheating, maybe I should use cold or lukewarm water?
It is used to cook the eggs at the correct temperature, which is about 75°C to 85°C for a custard. If you just put them in a 120°C oven, they will overheat and curdle. But they also won't start cooking before they reach 75°C (or a bit less, depending on the exact recipe). The water is used to maintain them in the correct temperature interval, neither too hot, nor too cold. If you use cold water, the eggs will start setting later. Pour hot, but not boiling, water into the bain marie, else you have to wait for the oven to heat it.
Thanks for your answer and the extra information. I will add that none of the 30 recipes in the book are custardy eggs. They are all eggs with the egg white and yolk still separated. I assume this makes no difference in oven and water temperature?
Interesting. Can you post a link to the book? But while the temperature needed for eggs varies depending on the dish, if they specify a bain marie, then the 75 to 85°C range is probably the correct one, else they would recommend another technique.
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46636 | Is there no use for high temperatures in ovens?
I'm about to buy a new oven. I can buy one which is able to steam the food, or one without.
The one with steam (a nice, but not necessary feature) only goes to 230 °C / 446 °F, while a regular one to 275 °C / 527 °F.
The salesman claimed that no one needs anything higher than the 446 °F, but I've used higher temperatures many times; pizza, roasting meat, etc.
Have I used too high temperatures before? Or was he just uninformed?
The salesman is full of crap. 450 °F is completely inadequate as an upper limit.
If you have successfully used high temperatures, then there is a use for them. When buying an appliance, think of you will use it, not how everyone else does.
My suspicions were confirmed. Kitchen salesmen tends (in my experience, 2 kitchens) to know that the customer is making a rather big investment and is out of their comfort zone, so they often act somewhat arrogant and superior.
If someone was wondering: I bought a really expensive one that both have steam AND can get to really high temperatures (300 C).
There is lots of use for high temperatures. Especially pizza is the first thing that comes to mind; there is no home oven which can get to the proper temperatures for a Neapoletana (which are above 500 Celsius), but more is always better.
Of course, the salesman will tell you what you need to hear to buy his product, don't listen to him. This still doesn't mean that you should only buy the oven with the highest max temperature; there are badly built ovens which claim to reach 300 Celsius but can't actually do it, in this case you are probably better off with a better quality oven with a lower nominal maximum temperature. It is probably best to compare reviews made by independent test organizations.
This somewhat crazy person uses a domestic oven that he's modified so that he can use the "self-clean" mode for cooking pizza.
He is absolutely wrong. You can't make a pizza properly at 450℉ / 232℃. You can buy a 1/4" / 6.3 mm piece of steel, put that under the broiler for 30 minutes, and then put the pizza on that. It will cook in approximately 2 minutes, which is what you want. A home oven typically cooks it for 7 or 8 minutes. At that temperature, the dough becomes much drier and the proteins in the cheese become completely different. You want super high heat to be transferred to the pizza as soon as possible. That provides the spring to the dough, making it rise super fast and cooking completely before it dries out. That gives you a crispy crust with a tender inside and big bubbles. It also melts the cheese so it does not “break” and separate the curd and whey.
You can cook many things at a super hot temperature, particularly if you have a convection fan.
The thing to remember, however, is that air is a bad transmitter of heat. You can hold your hand in air that is 212℉ / 100℃, but you can’t put it into a pot of boiling water. So for pizza or any kind of baking that you want to do very quickly, or making something like fajitas, steel is a good transmitter of heat. Something like a pizza stone is OK, but those are better at storing than transmitting. They work in commercial ovens because those get to be 900℉ / 482℃ or so, depending on whether they’re wood-fired or coal-fired.
The salesman is utterly and completely clueless.
Clueless, or maybe just trying to sell a particular model he's been instructed to push. Either way: disregard.
At 500F you can't make a true Neapolitan or NY style pizza, but you can come close to a Chicago-style, thin crust St. Louis-style standard-oven-pizzeria (with a stone or steel). Preheat and increase time by 20%, adjusting dough to be slightly wetter. Resting the dough in the fridge longer can help soften the texture too.
In addition to pizza almost any hard bread will require a temperature of at least 450f. There is really no other way to get a good crust on bread.
Also it is work noting that if steam is required there are oven designed for baking which include steam jets as well as the ability to reach temps in the range of 550-600f. However if you are going to do a lot of steam cooking I would not advise doing it in the oven.
As you suggest: the sales person was uninformed. Maybe commission driven.
For pizzas, a proper pizza stone will suffice.
Other: I don't know what recipe calls for blast furnace temperatures.
Pizza-relatives like Flammkuchen/Tarte flambée and many breads benefit from 250C+
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32338 | Type of oil to cook white/black pudding in?
What type of oil is best for pan frying either white pudding or black pudding?
I don't want to use bacon grease (I'm not cooking any bacon) and cannot fry it in its own fat (no fat renders out of most black/white pudding produced in the UK, where it is from, and has a standard consistency among most commercial recipes which makes dry frying impractical).
I rather them made in barbeque grill.
There isn't a standard universal black pudding recipe. If the answers you're getting are more appropriate for black puddings other than the one which you use, try posting the ingredients list and/or nutritional information (for the fat content).
Black and white puddings are mass produced in the UK and have very standard recipes. It's not greasy or oily, and the fat does not render out of it like sausage.
The question as originally posed didn't mention the UK. Black pudding goes back at least to ancient Greece (it's mentioned in the Odyssey), and most European countries have at least one version.
For the record, this edit to the question does not suit my purpose at all. I have worked in kitchens cooking this stuff for ages, but always used bacon grease. This is ridiculous and I protest this complete repurposing of my question. It appears to me that my question has been edited so as to not conflict with the top answer that has not been chosen as the correct one.
@bitfed while I don't see anything wrong with the edit (it didn't change your meaning as far as I can judge, just added the information that you mean the UK version which you specified in comments), you have by now noticed that you can rollback the question to the state before the edit. Closing the flag with no further interventions.
I'd like to either remove myself from this question, or somehow lock the editing of it. If anyone can approve edits to my question, I don't want to be associated with it. The question has been answered with an extremely helpful and specific answer, and I don't think it's right that this question should be edited so that a different answer appears more appropriate.
@bitfed All questions and answers on Stack Exchange sites are user-editable. If you have a fundamental problem with that, you do not have to use the site, but no one here can change the way the site works. With respect to specific edits to this question, the one you rolled back, as rumtscho said, did not actually change the meaning of the question or make a different answer seem more appropriate. It's unlikely anyone is going to try to substantially edit your question now that you've directly rejected a reasonable attempt to clarify it, so I don't think you have much to worry about.
And to be clear: suggested edits are rejected if they significantly change the post, and users with enough reputation to directly edit know better than to do that, but if they do, it's quite likely someone else will see it and roll it back - or you can.
I would like to leave this post behind without having to police it. Jefromi, your input on this situation seems to be less than unbaised.
An answer was chosen for the question as it is intentionally worded. There is no reason for this to be edited and I think we can all move on with our lives now.
I would normally use basic sunflower or vegetable oil, and fry gently to 'warm through', rather than 'crisp up'. I would imagine that walnut oil would add an interesting dimension to the flavour, but most black pud has enough flavour in my opinion so it doesn't need anything extra.
I've also had black pudding boiled, and deep-fried in batter, and microwaved, but I do think that sliced about 1cm thick and pan-fried provides the most satisfying texture.
Both black and white pudding is quite high in fat, usually in big chunks, so you don't really need any oil at all, especially if you're using a nonstick pan. Just be sure to use a medium-high heat so that the fat can render out and help fry the rest of the pudding.
This makes for a very bland experience.
Not really. Pork fat is tastier than any oil.
No, this makes for completely ruined black pudding. If you are frying it by itself, it needs oil or it will not cook correctly. Period. There may be some brand or make or recipe of it that would work for, but 99% of the time, this will not cook correctly. The fact that it's made with pork is irrelevant, it's not the same as sausage and there is little to no fat/oil runoff.
You must be using the world's leanest black pudding...
@bitfed I haven't cooked black pudding myself, but I've found sources saying it's anywhere from 14% to 35% fat by weight (not sure if this is before or after cooking). Bacon is close to half fat by weight before cooking and easily produces twice as much fat as you need to fry it, so it really sounds like ElendilTheTall is right here - unless your black pudding is exceptionally lean, there should be enough fat in it to fry it. If you're really cooking black/white pudding which is that much leaner than normal, you should include that information in your question.
If you don't use oil, at ANY temperature it's going to RUIN black pudding. Black and white pudding are basically oatmeal with fats and blood in it. It is NOT sausage.
@bitfed You realize black pudding is also called "blood sausage", right?
@bitfed I never said it was sausage, I said it had a lot of fat in it. And I feel compelled to defend Elendil here: I'm pretty sure that unlike me, he's from the UK and has cooked plenty of black pudding.
I feel compelled to point out that I'm not Heston Blumenthal, and also that a large part of cooking is subjective. I often dry fry black pudding and find it answers very well. If you don't, fine. What difference does it make if the answer has been up voted?
Because 'dry fry it' has so little to do with the question, it's as unhelpful as telling me to use bacon grease.
All frying is a dry cooking technique.
@Kareen That's a matter of linguistics and in no way contradicts what I'm trying to express here.
Looking at online recipes, it seems a lot of people use butter. But the milk solids in butter burn at high temperatures, and you do want to cook a black pudding at a fairly high temperature to keep it together and get a nice crust on the outside. So I'd suggest a neutral oil such as peanut oil. Or, if you're frying bacon as well, cook it in some of the leftover bacon fat for a nice rich flavour.
Thanks Joe, good advice here. I agree butter would be difficult to use without burning a bit. I went with olive oil on this particular occasion, as it was the most 'savory' oil I had on hand. It worked very well, but I will also consider peanut oil. Best suggestion so far. Thanks.
@bitfed There are tons of neutral oils, not just peanut oil, for example grapeseed oil, canola oil, and soybean oil (or in general, vegetable oil). This answer is essentially suggesting all of them. (See also this question.)
Yes, I agree. But that's not what is going down here on this question. What's going on is that the suggestion of dry frying it has the most votes. Which really shows me how useless this SE is, because that would ruin the food. I suspect these people have never cooked the average black/white pudding.
@bitfed Elendil's suggestion has a few votes because (1) it agrees with other information you can find online and (2) he knows what he's talking about. No one can stop you from disagreeing, but please don't insult the community here - they provide a lot of useful answers, and this question is no exception.
Bacon Fat always imo :) . If you can get black pudding more than 2 in in dia cut into 1/2in thick disks. If they are thin sausages, cut them long ways. Cook fast - crunchy on the outside and gooey inside. Serve with poached or soft fried egg on top.
I agree, but on this particular case I am looking for oils to use when I am not making any meats.
Where I come from, black or white pudding is traditionally fried in lard. My mother did that, my grandmother, and probably hers too.
For white pudding a nice extra virgin olive oil did the trick.
Can you explain why you think this was a good choice? You asked about the best oil.
Problem is that I've gotten only one suggestion that didn't tell me to use bacon grease. The only oil even mentioned was peanut oil, and I suspect olive oil does an identical job while being cheaper and more readily available.
The reason I ask is that it's essentially pointless to use extra virgin olive oil for this. It's almost certainly more expensive than all the neutral oils, and at best you cook off all the good flavor the olive oil has, while at worst it smokes and slowly tastes worse and worse. See this question or this question.
In London, UK, at the stores by my house, Olive Oil is cheaper than the rest and was PERFECT for cooking this food. The reason I was reluctant was because before doing it myself, I also suspected that the olive oil would either cook off the flavor or burn. But it didn't. It made the best white pudding I'd ever had.
Okay, that's great. We had no way to know, though, that your stores are unlike any that we've ever been to, or that it for some reason wouldn't smoke for you. Maybe it was pure olive oil, not extra virgin?
Another thing that these stores have that yours don't is black and white pudding. So I'm not sure how you can use that to question the relevance. Olive Oil is cheaper in Europe than the US. It's also where Black and White Pudding is available. And it is Extra Virgin.
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28196 | How many people would a bushel of average sized blue crabs feed?
I am getting a bushel of crabs tomorrow morning for football and dont know how many people to invite over. How many people do you think would all be able to have a good amount to eat out of a bushel of crabs?
also , the crabs are mixed... not a specific size.
You always learn something... I never heard about a bushel before in my life... So, for the metric users out there, it's about 36 liters. :)
@nico : a bushel is 4 pecks. Of course, I've never seen anyone measure anything in pecks, only bushel or half bushels. And a US bushel is smaller than an Imperial bushel
@Joe: yes, that was my source of knowledge about the ~36 liters! :D
just fyi: this was for a football party that some people ended up not making it to. 10 people knocked em out in 4 loads throughout the day from 1:00 to 8:30ish. We were a little uncomfortably stuffed by the end of the day, and really could have used some more people. And all of our teams lost that day, which didnt help. The bushel ended up being a little light, not to the brim, but it was a good day!
There's no fixed number, as you have too many other variables:
How big are the people eating? (athletes are going to eat more than kids or people on diets)
What are they being served with? (If it's just a table filled w/ crabs, they're going to eat more than if you have other side dishes available)
How experienced are the people with eating crabs? (Some folks are so slow at picking crabs they'll give up in annoyance. Others are so skilled they'll wolf them down quickly. In high school, some folks I know from the Eastern Shore would pick the backfin out then trash the rest, ignoring the flake and the claws)
How are they being served? (very spicy will slow most people down. And you have to remind the crab newbies to wash their hands before using the bathroom)
What temperature is it? (on really hot days, people eat less)
How long is it going to be? (if you're hanging out all day, people might get a second wind and go for more crabs)
I'm going to guess that if they're 'mixed', they're probably mediums, so maybe 7 or 8 dozen per bushell. 3 or 4 crabs per person is about typical, adjusting mostly based on the the factors above. (large, physically active folks or experienced pickers might eat 6 or more ... inexperienced folks often give up by the second one ... but you'll want more if you're doing it as an all-day thing, or if it's almost all crabs and hardly any sides)
I guess just make sure you have plenty of drinks and some sides for those that give up on the crabs or if you run out.
...
And don't just go and pitch the shells afterwards ... you can generally get quite a bit more meat going them a second look through (the folks who skipped claws if nothing else), and picking whatever's left over. Freeze that meat, then rinse the legs (most people don't crack and suck them) to get most of the seasoning off, crack them, and simmer them to make a crab stock for bisque. If you have a really large pot, go for the rest of the shells, too ... strain, boil it down to concentrate it, then freeze.
You'd be tempted to add extra stuff to the stock besides the shells, but as we don't know how much seasoning's still on the crabs, you really need to wait 'til it's done, then add other stuff when using it to make the final dish.
Asians. Asians have a tendency to be experts at shelling and eating crab quickly so be wary. I can be an unscientifically small sample size of 1 to demonstrate at said crab bake. Or... you could just ask your guests too...
I always wanted to try making crab stock from the shells, but am usually too tired after eating crabs all day to worry about anything other than just getting rid of the evidence. I want to try a seafood chili with it.
@jumpdart : likely too late at this point, but after rinsing, you can break them into smaller bits so they'll compact better, then bag and freeze, and deal with another day.
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43725 | Can a spice grinder be used for coffee permanently?
My father bought a spice grinder thinking it was a coffee grinder. He is very stubborn and does not want to return it (also it was the most expensive grinder from the store) Can it still be used for coffee? I feel like it will break sooner since spices are softer than coffee so the grinder is not design the same.
This model
Also, there is no mention of coffee in the manual
Can you post a picture? There are types of each that are actually the same thing.
@Jolenealaska There is no mention of coffee in the manual.
https://www.cuisinart.com/share/images/products/full/sg-10.jpg
That sure looks like a rotary style coffee grinder! The reviews on Amazon say it works for cinnamon so I would think that it would also work for coffee, but it's hard to say how well. I'd keep the Cuisinart for spices and buy a burr grinder for coffee. But that's just me.
Show your dad this
Honestly I don't see the point of rotary grinders at all. No reason you can't use a burr grinder for spices too.
@leon Except that you don't want to use the same grinder for both. Cumin flavored coffee doesn't sound good.
Cumin, caraway and nutmeg are not softer than coffee.
@Jolenealaska I wash my grinder in between use. Old Coffee oil goes rancid and will ruin the next coffee too.
@leon You wash it with water?? Most people just run rice through it. I've never known anyone to use water.
I wash my hand grinder with water because its easy to take apart. I'll also take apart and wash my mini mazzer about once every three months, but strangely enough, I've never heard of anyone using rice before. I'll definitely give it a try and report back.
The Cuisinart SG-10 spice grinder it designed to grind soft and hard spices. There is no reason why it couldn't do coffee
The SG-10 manual even mentions nutmeg, which is significantly tougher than coffee
Many coffee "professionals" like the burr grind (like a pepper grinder), compared to the rotary blade grind (like a small food processor), but either will work fine
Also, many people grind spices in rotary blade coffee grinders, so it comes down to which style of grinding you like
One issue with rotary ground coffee is the inconsistency of grind size. There will be too many fine particles that will leech out of the coffee holding/filter mechanism. If you don't want solid particles in your coffee use a burr grinder
I've been using a spice grinder to grind coffee every day for fifteen years. Hasn't broken yet.
Everything that TFD mentions in his answer is correct, there's no reason you can't use your grinder for coffee.
However, there are two main issues with rotary grinders for coffee:
The particle size won't be consistent. This can lead to more fines
in your cup if you are brewing using a filter method. It will also
cause over-extraction on the fines and under-extraction on the large
pieces, leading to unwanted flavours in your final cup.
With a rotary grinder, the fineness of your grind is usually
relative to time, whereas with an adjustable burr grinder the
fineness is relative to the gap between the two grinding burrs.
This makes it a lot harder to get a consistent grind size for your coffee
with a rotary grinder and you'll likely have to suffer through a lot
of bad coffee until you can guesstimate properly what grind size
you're after.
My reccomendation is that you return the grinder and buy a hand grinder (burr of course) like the hario skerton (about $30).
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25116 | How to make a New York cheesecake with a super creamy, silky texture?
I've been baking New York cheesecake for a few years now and, with the help of various recipes and some experimentation, I've been able to get pretty close to the flavor and texture of the best New York cheesecakes I remember (or, at least think I remember!) from my childhood. However, one aspect of texture I'd like to improve is creaminess.
As much as I like the texture of the cheesecakes that I bake, whenever I compare them with cheesecakes from Studebaker, a local specialty baker in northern California, the Studebaker cheesecake has a more silky, smooth mouth feel.
Can anyone suggest ways to achieve a creamier, silkier, smoother cheesecake texture? If it would help, I'm happy to add details of how I make my cheesecakes. For now, I'll just say that it's pretty close to this recipe, but I do it without the cherry topping: smittenkitchen.com/2010/04/new-york-cheesecake/.
It's all in the temperature. See this answer. I do it a little bit different, but the idea is the same. High temp at first, low temp the rest of the way.
Thanks @BaffledCook. I already use that cooking method and it's always given me pretty good results, but not as good as I'd like. If I want to experiment, what changes are more likely to give a silkier texture? Should I try lowering the temperature and cooking longer? Less/more time at an initial high temperature? Other possibilities? Thanks for any suggestions you might have.
I think I start at 175ºC for 10 min, then lower to 110ºC for 50 min. My oven handles that without having to turn it off and letting it cool. I'll check my notes tomorrow.
Hahaha...... I just typed out an answer for this, and then realized that @BaffledCook linked to an old answer of mine that said the exact same thing I had just written...
@mrwienerdog, auch!
I start at 175ºC for 15min and lower it to 110 for 45min.
I'm doubting about answering or closing the question.
@mrwienerdog- I don't think this question is similar enough to the old question you answered to be closed as a duplicate. If you feel like your same answer applies as well to this question then I think you should undelete it. Perhaps refer to your older answer and add details about what in particular contributes to smoothness?
Okay, I undeleted my OP to this question (to be honest, not sure how similar the two are...., never checked that closely). The most important thing to watch for in terms of the 'silkiness' would be the mixing and ingredient temp. When all ingredients are at room temp, they homogonize much quicker, and require far less mixing, therefore less air is incorporated, making for a denser product. I think this should help.
Short of that, it could be recipe. A perfect cheesecake recipe is hard to find (luckily, I have one). Can I post it here? I don't think it's allowed.....
Answer I typed yesterday (sorry if it is essentially a dupe)..... I' @ work, don't have time to check too closely...
I have made thousands of cheesecakes. My pastry chef taught me how a method that has always worked:
Always use room temperature ingredients. NEVER overmix,
incorporation of air is your enemy Set your oven to 300 F (sorry, in
Canada we are metric, but use Farenheit for baking).
Place your cheesecake in a water bath. Bake for 30 minutes.
Turn off the oven and open its door, allow the cheesecake to rest for 30 minutes, sitting in the oven in this state.
After the thirty minute rest, carefully close the door, and set the oven to 300 F again. Bake another 30 minutes (I have sometimes had to go to 40 minutes depending on oven).
And that's it. Works every time. I am so thankful he taught me this. As an added bonus, you will get a cake that is flat like a board, with no cracks.
@mrwienerdog I tried your method--minimal mixing, water bath, two baking periods w/oven off in between--and the texture was indeed excellent and the best I've ever achieved. Thanks very much. The flavor was pretty good too, but if only I could get your recipe (hint, hint!) maybe I could improve that as well.
@eipi10 I finally had a chance to post it... Go to http://cuppa.net46.net/index.php
and follow the link 'New York Cheesecake'
@mrwienerdog Searching through this site, I stumbled upon this question/answer. Will try out this method next time I bake a cheesecake. Do you happen to still have said recipe? The link doesn't seem to work anymore.
You should lower the temp, allow more time, add more cream, and add more egg yolks.
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35060 | Brined cheese behaves almost as if carbonated
I bought (at least what I thought was) some Bulgarian/Turkish-style brined soft cheese today, and when I got home I noticed the container seemed over-pressurised (it's sold in a kind of tall tin can/metal cylinder, and both ends bulged noticeably).
Upon opening I, hardy surpricing, got the soda bottle effect (and a bunch of brine over my shirt). The whole thing smells kinda strange (I can't think of a better word than "chemical") and the brine behaved almost as if carbonated (it "fizzed" when I took out a bit of cheese), but there's nothing visibly strange about the cheese itself.
I tasted a tiny piece (taken from the inside of a block and after quickly rinsing it), and it has a very strange, rather acrid taste. I've bought similar soft cheeses from the same producer before (a couple of different kinds), and they've always been fine.
As I'd feel silly for throwing out 1kg of cheese due to being uneducated I'd like to know whether the cheese is simply off or if it's of some variety unknown to me. If the latter case, what is one supposed to do with it? In the, arguably, more likely case that it's simply contaminated/gone bad, I'd be curious to know why it's behaving the way it does.
Some additional info:
Just noticed it has expiry date today. That being said, I can't remember having any problems with similar cheeses even few days after the expiry date, and then after having been opened several days earlier.
The ingredients list is as follows: "Pasteurized milk, salt, starter culture, vegetable rennet"
There's a large label in some language Google Translate identifies as Turkish, but more or less fails to translate:
Bildiǧiniz lezzet, özlediǧiniz peynir!
Onbir ayin sultani
RAMAZAN'A [iFTAR'LIK VE SAHUR'LUK] öZEL PAYNiR
Hi Tilo and welcome to the site. While your question has a lot of details, which is a good thing, I don't think the question itself has enough stress. Am I correct assuming you want to know if "there is something wrong with your cheese or if it's a special variety? And if the latter, do you need to do something with it?"
@Mien, good point, I hope I've made it more clear.
Re: the translation. I don't speak Turkish, but I've identified a few words and sentences: "Eleventh month raisins", "Special for Ramadan", "Cheese Special Flavor".
@belisarius I'd managed to get the Ramadan one as well, but missed the others, thanks! Special flavour indeed...
This cheese sounds completely off. I urge you to discard it.
There are no cheeses I know of that should generate pressure like that, nor have an acrid odor.
Figured as much, though I wanted to hear someone else say it before I threw out 1kg of cheese (I'll accept this answer unless someone else comes up with some additional explanation soon).
Sorry, I would hate wasting that much too...
Return it. It should never have been sold.
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116737 | Dealing with excess liquid in a rice dish
I was making hoppin' john and realized I added too much chicken stock relative to the rest of my ingredients -- 8 cups instead of 6. When I reached the point where I would otherwise take the pot off the burner and let it sit for 5 minutes, then fluff the rice and serve ... well at that point I had a soup.
I tried doing what I would do if I ended up with too much liquid when making rice: I spooned off the excess liquid and let it simmer uncovered on low for 5 minutes; then let it sit, fluffed it, etc. The end result still ended up a lot wetter than I'd like; the rice was more like a gloopy risotto than anything close to dry, distinct grains. The taste didn't seem to be affected.
Is there a better way of dealing with an "oh shucks, everything's cooked but I have excess liquid" situation when cooking a dish like this? I found that spooning the excess liquid off was quite difficult, I kept scooping up little bits of stuff that I'd otherwise rather stayed in the dish like beans or rice grains or bits of onion.
(For those unfamiliar, hoppin' john is basically stewed black-eyed peas and rice. Fry up some salt pork, onions, and garlic; add peas, ham, red and black pepper, cook for an hour; add rice, simmer 20 minutes until tender; rest 5 minutes, fluff with fork. Variations/family derivatives abound.)
This kind of meal is something which my grandmother would typically prepare in the oven. If you make it there, in a wide and flat casserole dish (the depth should be 2-3 cm) at not too high a temperature, you can easily leave it inside until the water has evaporated completely, without fear of burning. It will take a long time to happen, but that is acceptable and even desirable in an oven stew.
If you insist on doing it on stovetop, using a sieve would be much easier than spooning. If you don't have a large sieve that can do it in a few batches, you can also try a colander, catching the liquid with all the rice falling through the holes, and then pouring the liquid through a smaller sieve to retrieve the rice. Also make sure to catch at least some liquid, so your dish won't burn when you return it to the stovetop. Let it cook a little bit. It probably won't taste exactly like the original, since the waterlogged rice kernels will stay wetter than usual after a short heating, but it will be a solid dish and not a soup.
Add rice.
Or anything else that is dried and starchy and will drink up the juice. If you add more rice you will overcook the rice that you already have - that might not be so bad. Or you could add instant rice if you have it, or instant oats. Or couscous. Instant mashed potatoes are usually my go-to for drinking up the extra liquid because I keep it on the shelf, it drinks it up immediately, and it goes with everything.
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29824 | Kneading and rolling fondant icing without air bubbles
I recently did a short cake decoration course and we rolled out fondant to prepare cake boards and then cover the cakes with fondant. The work surface there was absolutely clean with no scratches and when I kneaded and rolled out fondant, there were no air pockets or bubbles formed.
I then started making cakes at home and the kitchen bench here is not without scratches or bumps. So, I ended up buying a cake mat (plastic sheet) and every single time, there have been air bubbles in the fondant, which I had to remove using a toothpick. But it still leaves a mark on the icing once it goes on the cake.
The question is whether rolling the icing on the plastic cake mat can cause the air bubbles or am I doing something wrong when kneading the fondant? I am using the same store bought fondant as the one we used in the class.
I found this after researching a bit and tried the recommended method for kneading. According to it, too much folding while kneading causes air bubbles. So, to keep the air bubbles at a minimum, push out with the heel of hand. Stand stretched fondant up on it's side, push down, turn and repeat. I tried to fold as little as possible and instead of getting 6-7 air bubbles, only got 1.
It's most likely (in my opinion) that the air (and subsequently air bubbles) is being introduced into your fondant at the kneading process rather than anything to do with your rolling method or surface used to roll on.
Perhaps experiment a little on a more gentle but firm (as opposed to vigorous) kneading method and see if that removes those air bubbles in your fondant.
Are you kneading the fondant in the same way as instructed on the course?
Yes, I am kneading it exactly in the same way. The only difference is that I knead it on the plastic cake mat and there are air bubbles under the mat (between the mat and the glass dining table). But I don't know if that has any consequence on it.
@Divi Then all I can suggest is that you experiment with different kneading techniques and rolling on different surfaces until you can determine what's causing the air bubbles to form in the fondant.
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28032 | Mixing cooking chocolate with normal chocolate
I have some cooking chocolate and I have some chocolate seashells. I've had the chocolate seashells for some time now and I want to use them because I don't want them to go to waste. So, I was thinking of mixing some of the chocolate seashells with the cooking chocolate to make chocolate cups (melt the chocolate together and use it to make chocolate cups) and then filling them with panna cotta. The question is if mixing the 2 types of chocolate a bad idea or if mixing just a small amount of chocolate seashells with the cooking chocolate work?
I'm a little confused about the types of chocolate that you have. Is the cooking chocolate baking chocolate (1 oz squares)? And are the shells a pre-formed and tempered that's intended to be filled?
When you say cooking chocolate do you mean chocolate-flavoured cake coating like Scotbloc?
Sorry about the confusion, by cooking chocolate I mean, the sort of chocolate you use to make chocolate cakes and brownies, etc. and by chocolate shells I mean, chocolate in seashell shapes. The reason why I mentioned seashells is because the chocolate seashells taste a bit different to something like a normal milk chocolate.
People use all sorts of chocolate to make chocolate cake or brownies. Also, manufacturers can shape anything into seashells. Please tell us the ingredients list if you want us to help, I still have no idea what you are trying to mix.
@rumtscho: I just simply want to melt and mix cooking chocolate with the normal milk chocolate. The recipes everywhere say that I should be using cooking chocolate, but I was wondering if the cooking and normal milk chocolate can be mixed or does it end up in disaster. Like I said before, the reason why I mentioned seashells is because the chocolate seashells taste a bit different to something like a normal milk chocolate like dairy milk.
This doesn't answer rumtschos question. The problem is that we can't help you when we don't know stuff like the fat content etc. If you want to be sure to avoid a disaster, just dissolve some chocolate in hot milk, making it a delicious hot chocolate to drink ;-)
Divi, I would try a sample melting of the two chocolates - do this very slowly in a double boiler or if you are super-careful, in a microwave - to see how the two chocolates react to being mixed once melted.
If they mix adequately, drop the test mix on a piece of wax paper and let it cool to see how the re-hardened mixture firms up. Based on your experiment, you should have a better idea of what to expect with the two dissimilar chocolates. (rumtscho has a good point that without knowing exactly what the two chocolates are, it's hard to give an answer.)
I added about 50gms of the milk chocolate to 200gms of dark chocolate and it turned out fine. Thanks for the tip.
@Divi, thanks for the update, I'm glad it worked out! :-)
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45214 | Rice - Expiration Date
How relevant is the expiration date on uncooked Rice (different varieties)? Are there ways to store rice to prolong it life?
This website: http://www.eatbydate.com/grains/rice-shelf-life-expiration-date/ has the following table.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
| Dry | Pantry | Refrigerator | Freezer |
--------------------------------------------------------------------
| White Rice | 4-5 Years | - | - |
| Oxygen Free White Rice | 25-30 Years | - | 30* Years |
| Brown Rice | 6-8 Months | 8-12 Months | - |
| Wild Rice | 6-8 Months | - | - |
| Minute Rice | 4-5 years | - | - |
--------------------------------------------------------------------
| Cooked | Pantry | Refrigerator | Freezer |
--------------------------------------------------------------------
| White Rice | - | 5-7 Days | 6-8 Months |
| Brown Rice | - | 4-5 Days | 6-8 Months |
| Wild Rice | - | 5-7 Days | 6-8 Months |
--------------------------------------------------------------------
From personal experience, rice that has been picked recently has a much better taste. I normally buy rice from the Asian market that has a harvested date on it. Often this date is within the last month. After about 6 months the rice tends to start losing its aromatic flavors.
Brown rice has a much shorter shelf life than white rice, and will go bad if kept in a humid or hot environment. If you aren't going to use rice within 1-2 years I would say maybe freeze it so it will keep the aromatic flavors longer.
Expiration dates are used by food distributors as an inventory control rather than a safety notification in the US.
Some packages may be marked Best by. That refers to flavor and texture not safety.
My issue with rice is the pantry moths. I buy rice in 2-5lb bags. I place the bag inside a ziplock freezer bag and put it in the freezer for at least 24 hours. I remove it to the refrigerator to defrost, and keep it sealed to avoid internal condensation. This kills off any bugs. I keep it inn the zip lock bag until I use it. I keep it in a kitchen cupboard at room temperature
This technique works for all grains and starches which could attract bugs, including wheat flour.
I have found old packets of rice in the cupboard that are perhaps 3 years old. They have cooked up well although as Meskarune noted, the flavor was a a bit stale. It was fine as a base for a sauce,etc.
Rice has a pretty long shelf life. Are we talking about white rice, brown rice, or what? White rice, stored in the pantry, can last a good 4-5 years.
Brown rice has a shorter shelf life than other rice because it includes the rice germ, which has a high oil content. What limits the shelf life is the oil going rancid, which can occur in 6 months (or less in hot weather).
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45286 | Baking or Cooking - why orange and not other sweet citrus fruit?
In most of the recipes that have any sweet citrus flavoring, it is usually Orange (zest and juice). In fact I've hardly seen a recipe that uses a substitute like mandarin, grapefruit, etc. Is there a reason why orange takes a preference and how easy is it to be substituted with another citrus? Lime and lemon of course are used a lot, but I'm referring to sweeter citrus fruit like orange, mandarin, grapefruit, etc.
The reason for this question is that I was looking for an orange a month back and couldn't find it in any big supermarket. So, I bought a blood orange for its zest but luckily, after hours of looking, found one at a small grocer. So, if the situation comes up again, how do I know what to substitute the orange with? This is the recipe I wanted to make.
FWIW: Substitute willy-nilly, your results will not be what the recipe was making, but the dish may be brilliant. That's a big part of what makes cooking fun.
If you do experiment with substitution, be mindful that acidity does vary among different citrus fruit varieties, and changes in acidity can affect leavening in many baking recipes.
I don't claim that this is a canonical answer, but it seems to be a bit like the situation with apples. You have cooking apples and eating apples, which have been bred for different traits. Similarly you have juicing oranges, eating oranges, and bitter oranges (used for marmalade). The other citrus fruits which taste most like oranges (mandarins, clementines, tangarines) are more suited for division into segments, and you're more likely to see them used for decoration. You could juice them if you don't have a better option, but recipes will tend to use the most suitable commonly available option.
Grapefruit has a very different flavour, so you have to take that into account when substituting. It's also not necessarily sweet, and certainly I have never seen grapefruit sold as "sweet grapefruit" or "bitter grapefruit".
one thing for grapefruit, is that it does a lot mroe of undesirable chemical reactions when combined with other stuff than orange. Lots of medication should not be taken in cunjunction with this fruit. I guess it could influence the taste as well.
@JoBedard as far as I am aware, grapefruit is not more likely than any other fruit to enter a chemical reaction with random stuff. It is just that it has one or two reactions with molecules found in the human body, and digestion changes from it. But it is as likely to react with something outside of the body as other fruits are.
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44840 | What is the origin of fried potato?
What is the origin of fried potato? Is it France that introduced it through French fries to the world?
EDIT: By origin I mean the first most popular amongst the world.
I'm not sure there's a culinary question here - this seems more about history, which although interesting is bordering on off-topic and outside the area of expertise for users here.
I think this question is unanswerable. The real origin (in which country was the first potato in the world fried) is certainly not documented, it probably predates writing. As for current popularity, there is no single measure, and if it were, nobody can do the statistics, because nobody is going to homes and restaurants to document whether they fry, boil or bake the potatoes they buy.
@rumtscho Would appreciate your insight on this in meta: http://meta.cooking.stackexchange.com/questions/1921/are-questions-about-the-history-of-foods-and-cooking-off-topic
Opinion is divided (usually along the border) as to whether the French or the Belgians invented French fries. The name favours the former, but this is possibly due to the fact that the French are seen as having invented gastronomy in general.
It is probably impossible to answer - who knows when the first adventurous cook decided to try frying potato alongside his piece of fish?
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40754 | Can I bake 2 small cakes at the same time?
I have to bake 3 small white cholocate mudcakes and put them together to make the final butt shaped cake, which I will ganache and fondant. I have to bake 1 rectangle cake (for the back) and 2 half hemisphere round cakes (for the cheeks).
I have one rectangle pan 13cmx24cm and one 16cm half hemisphere round pan. I was wondering if I could bake the rectangle and one half round cake at the same time in the middle rack of my fan force oven or will that be a risk and make the cakes dry or undercooked? I usually bake them at 150 degrees.
How deep will the batter be in each?
I think about 3/4ths in both the pans. They're almost the same height/depth
As long as you monitor each cake for doneness individually, there is no reason not to bake them together—assuming they both need the same temperature.
If the sizes are radically different (in terms of the thinnest dimension, which is usually the depth) you may need to adjust temperature to control crust formation during the time it takes the cakes through to the center.
If the cakes are close in depth, they should bake in approximately equal times.
You may wish to use cake strips or aluminum foil to protect the thing easily burned permiter of a hemispherical cake.
Note that 150 C (300 F) is an atypically low temperature for baking a cake.
See related: Additional Cooking Time When baking more than one loaf of quick bread
Should've mentioned, its a mudcake, which is generally baked at a low temperature
If it is typical for your recipe, then cool; the main thing is thta if the two layers are about the same depth, they should require the same time at a given temperature.
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44914 | Kneading dough - significance of warm hands
I made bread the other day and kneaded the dough by hand. The recipes everywhere ask for warm water, which is understandabe for the yeast to rise.
When my mother kneads dough using the same recipe, it turns out much softer and her bread in turn is softer. I wonder if it is because her hands are generally warm and mine cold? Or is it just a different kneading technique.
Are you using the same type of flour and yeast too?
@MichaelE. Exactly the same and very similar kneading techniques
Same water source? I bake almost exclusively sourdough over the past 4 years and water source has affected my breads 'softness'. ( or maybe it affects yeast performance and gluten development).
@MichaelE. Water source could be different.
@Divi- I live on the San Francisco peninsula. Our tap water contains Chloramine. Through trial and error - and comments from a brewer friend - I've learned to slow boil the water for 30 min. in order to get rid of it in order to get better yeast activity ( and probably other things ) which resulted in 'softer' bread. I used to live near the source/reservoir. Since I've moved, my bread has reacted differently - same ingredients and process. Anyway, I'm not sure that this is an answer for you, though I recommend you try to use the same water mom uses and rule any water differences out.
@MichaelE. Thanks, will let you know if that makes any difference
@MichaelE. Please see my comment to rumtscho
Thanks for the follow up. Interesting. What is a "bit more than you do" equate to? I rest mine around 10 min (or so) between.
The temperature influences the speed of rising, but to significantly change the dough hardness, you need a very cold temperature. Even if your hands are "cold", they are certainly above air temperature, and firming up dough through coldness is only possible if you use very cold ingredients, below fridge temperature (4 Celsius).
It could be kneading technique, if by "technique" you mean the amount or type of lubricant added. Some people knead in a bowl of flour until the dough stops sticking. This will give you a very hard dough. Some use minimal amounts of flour during kneading, and yet others may knead without a lubricant, or using oil or water. Again, this is a very likely culprit in achieving different grades of softness.
A somewhat more "hidden" influence would be the direction of kneading (do you align your gluten into sheets or ropes, or do you just knead directionless) and the relaxation time given to the dough during kneading. The length will also play a role, longer kneaded dough develops more gluten and becomes tougher. But while these differences will contribute to a harder (actually "tighter") dough during kneading, they should be reduced after proofing. And the baked bread won't be harder, but slightly more translucent and chewy. This is because they result in more gluten, and what you describe (bread harder after baking) points to more flour.
So, if there is no difference in lubricant addition, one of you is probably measuring differently from the other and ending with a different ratio. Maybe one or both of you measures by volume, or is using a badly calibrated scale.
Thanks, the way you described, it does seem that there could be some subtle differences that could be leading to different results. I'll try using the same scales as my mum's and see if that makes any difference and pay more attention to the direction
I invited my mum over for making the bread using all my ingredients and equipment and the bread turned out very soft again. But I did notice this time that she relaxes the dough between every knead a bit more than I do and her "kneads" stretch the dough a bit more. Can't think of anything else.
How are each of you measuring your ingredients? If, for example, you both use a scale and you both measure to within a few grams, then that's not likely the cause of the difference. If even one of you measures by volume, then there are likely differences in how much flour gets into the dough. One informal poll I read had people measure flour by volume however they normally did that, then weighed that cup of flour. The amount of flour in that cup ranged from around 80 or 90 grams to over 200 grams. Whether someone sifts, fluffs, scoops, or spoons can make a difference in the amount of flour used.
More flour in the dough, the drier the dough and tougher it is. Less flour means a softer, wetter dough. That can account for what you describe.
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44915 | Making batter one day, baking the next
I have to bake a white chocolate mud cake after work and I am always left with some batter, which I then use to bake cupcakes. As mudcake takes a couple of hours to bake (at least my recipe), by the time I will finish, it will be too late to bake the cupcakes.
Is it possible to leave the cupcake batter in the cupcake baking tray in the fridge to be baked the next day? Are there any tips when doing so?
EDIT: Here's the ingredients:
WHITE CHOC MUDCAKE
500 g butter (melted in microwave)
400 ml water
300 g white chocolate (melted in microwave)
2 cups caster sugar
5 eggs (large)
2 cups plain flour
2 cups self raising flour
The rest is just mixing wet with dry ingredients and baking at 150 degrees till baked.
It would probably be helpful if you shared the specific recipe so we know what we are working with.
@PrestonFitzgerald: I will update the question soon with the recipe details
@PrestonFitzgerald: Updated as requested
Is the leavening in self-rising flour "double-acting" ? If so, you'll get some leavening when the mixture is heated, but you'd have already lost much of the bubbles escaping. See my answer about storing pancake batter
I would bake the cupcakes before baking the cake. Or reduce the amount of every ingredient a bit to prevent having leftovers.
It most likely will not work well to do that. Unfortunately, baking powder (in this case in your self-rising flour) starts the chemical reaction that gives cakes their lift as soon as the powder meets liquid. If the baking powder is single action, all of the bubbles are created when the water meets liquid and the heat of baking doesn't really play a role. If the baking powder is double action, some of the leavening reaction occurs when the batter is mixed, the rest of it happens while baking. So, if your self rising flour is made with single action baking soda, the cupcakes will fail if the batter is held overnight. If your self rising flour is made with double action baking powder the cupcakes will not have all of the lift they should, but may be OK. I have many times saved pancake batter for 24 hours and used it with no problem (flour, double action baking powder, baking soda, salt, buttermilk, eggs), but optimal lift isn't as crucial in a breakfast pancake as it would be for cupcakes.
That thought does present a possible "out of the box" solution to your problem. Could you cook your leftover batter on the stove while the cake is baking? I would try one in a skillet with a lot of butter, flip it when it's good and bubbly. I don't know where you are from or if pancakes are something with which you are familiar, but pancake batter and cake batter are very similar. They wouldn't be cupcakes, they would be something else entirely, but they could be very good.
If you decide to make cupcakes with day-old batter and your self rising flour is made with single action baking soda, or you're not sure, you should make your own "self rising flour" to give yourself the best odds. For 2 cups (`225 grams) of cake or pastry flour (soft, lower protein than all purpose) add 3 tsp double action baking powder and 1/2 tsp salt.
I'm assuming that you've considered cooking the cake and the cupcakes simultaneously in the oven and you have reason to not do that.
(Edited after Joe's comment about single vs double action baking powder)
Thanks and yes, I am familiar with pancakes, cakes and cupcakes. I am partucularly after cupcakes.
@Divi How long do the cupcakes take to bake? Could it possibly work to just reverse the order and bake the cupcakes first?
Cupcakes take about 40-50 minutes as well because of the type of batter. But that's a good idea.
@Divi I'm imagining stacking pancakes with some kind of filling in between, maybe cream cheese frosting (?), something that will solidify a bit in the fridge overnight. Then tightly wrapping the whole thing and decorating/frosting it the next day. That doesn't help if you want something to bring to an elementary school class, but it could be a really cool dessert. :)
It would definitely be yum, but I want to decorate and then sell these cupcakes at work :)
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52037 | Semifreddo vs Ice Cream
What is the difference between semifreddo and ice cream? Is it just the cooking method and the time for which they are frozen?
Google translates Semi freddo as semi cold. Half frozen is probably a bit closer in practice to an English translation of what it is, or more accurately, what it should be.
So many recipes on-line are fully frozen like ice cream, that the distinction is muddled. TRUE semifreddo is ice cream (or gelato) often mixed with something not frozen, like whipped cream, or not hard frozen to begin with.
Jamie Oliver makes it by freezing a custard until firm, then letting it sit in the refrigerator for 20 minutes before serving it over a warm compote.
Giada De Laurentiis has a version that uses Lemoncello, which keeps the custard mixture from freezing hard.
Semifreddo is not churned like ice cream, it's usually frozen in a pan or on a sheet tray, then sliced or mixed with a non-frozen component.
+1 for not churned :) Doesn't have to be mixed with a non-frozen component though.
It doesn't have to be, just often is. I see that my answer doesn't say as such...edited.
And I must say it looks like its much easier to make :)
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43183 | How to reheat pork belly: keep the crackling crackly?
I cooked a kilo pork belly yesterday with a very nice crackling in a roasting pan with a rack so that the pork does not touch the pan. Once we had dinner, I put it in the fridge without covering (in the same tray with the rack I roasted it).
I have reheated pork belly in the past in a microwave but that just makes the crackling chewy. Is it possible to reheat pork belly without losing the crackling or over-drying the meat?
I would recommend separating the crackling from the meat and re-heating both separately. The meat can go into the oven (or the microwave), the crackling can go under the grill (aka broiler).
The grill isn't a good option here. The crackling will burn before it reheats. Keeping things crispy requires convective heat, not radiant heat.
Try reheating it in the oven or a toaster oven; the dry heat should prevent things from getting chewy. The microwave often imparts undesirable texture changes in food when it heats things, so that's probably your issue more than the refrigeration; any condensation from the fridge should evaporate when exposed to dry heat. I'd toss it in at 350 and check on it periodically until it's warmed enough for you.
The reason why your pork crackling became soft after taking out of fridge is because the skin crackling process wasn't 100% complete. A perfect crackling stays crisp even after 2 days sitting in the fridge.
Having said that. The simplest reheat process is to place the entire piece of meat with skin facing up in an air fryer or conventional over ( never use the microwave ). Reheat at 400F for 10-15 minutes.
To prevent the softer meat from burning, wrap aluminium foil around it.
What makes you think the crackling was soft out of the fridge?
I like the air fryer approach. I reheated at 400 degrees for 9 minutes since the skin was originally properly cooked. I placed the belly on the side of the rack to keep it upright with the skin up. The skin is crunchy, the meat moist and my tongue/stomach are happy.
Great approach.
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64533 | Can I freeze custard?
I have some spare egg yolks that I want to use and not throw away and I've decided to make some vanilla custard. But I have no use for the custard right now and might decide to make Portuguese tarts later.
So, is it possible to freeze custard and for how long will it keep? If yes, are there any tips to thaw it?
Freezing and thawing the prepared custard will likely result in an undesirable texture. However, you can successfully freeze just the egg yolks.
According to the American Egg Board's eggcyclopedia:
The gelation property of egg yolk causes it to thicken or gel when frozen, so you need to give yolks special treatment. If you freeze them as they are, egg yolks will eventually become so gelatinous that they will be almost impossible to use in a recipe.
To help retard this gelation, beat in either 1/8 teaspoon salt or 1
1/2 teaspoons sugar or corn syrup per 1/4 cup of egg yolks (about 4
yolks). Label the container with the number of yolks, the date, and
whether you’ve added salt (for main dishes) or sweetener (for baking
or desserts).
Curiously, in the United States, soft ice cream is sometimes called Frozen Custard. As @Jolenealaska points out, you could make that instead, though it's probably quite different than what you have in mind.
https://www.seriouseats.com/2015/08/ice-cream-style-guide.html#midwest It's not just regular soft-serve with a different name.
Custard does not freeze well, it has a tendency to separate. If you do freeze it, freeze it right away, leave it frozen for as little time as possible, and defrost it in the refrigerator. I wouldn't leave it in the freezer for more than a month.
One way to freeze custard and get great results is to make ice cream! If you have an ice cream maker, great. If not, that's OK too. Custard based ice creams get less icy than other types of ice cream when made without churning. Just thoroughly stir every half an hour while freezing for at least three hours.
If you add 1/2 tsp of cornflour to your custard before freezing it will prevent it from separating/curdling during the defrosting stage. Also let it defrost naturally in the fridge rather than using a microwave to defrost as the heat from the microwave may cause the egg yolks to actually cook and all you'll end up with is sweet scrambled eggs.
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64445 | How to buy eggs to avoid dark specks
There have been many occasions when I've bought eggs and on breaking them, they have little specks of dark solids inside (sometimes a lot and sometimes too much). I generally, just remove them by a spoon if its not too much of it but when I see there's a lot of it, I end up throwing the egg and hate the wastage.
What are these dark solids? Is there a general rule of thumb for buying good quality eggs without those specks?
EDIT: I always buy free range eggs from one brand (unless not available) and they are brown eggs from Australian chickens.
Have you always bought eggs from the same source/brand ? Do the more problematic eggs tend to be of 1 or 2 brands ?
In that case (in response to your edit) switch to white eggs, which will likely have fewer blood/tissue spots as per my answer. There is no other significant difference between white and brown eggs from chickens.
@Jolenealaska: I do find that when the brown egg shell has more spots, the inside has more specks as well. Will try white eggs
The spots aren't anything to worry about.
From Egg Safety Center
Eggs with blood spots and meat spots are fine to eat. Most eggs with blood or meat spots are detected by electronic spotters and never reach the market, but it’s impossible to catch them all. Blood or meat spots are caused by the rupture of a blood vessel on the yolk surface when it’s being formed or by a similar accident in the wall of the oviduct in the hen’s reproductive tract. Blood spots and meat spots do not pose a risk to human health when prepared properly.
In the US, eggs farmed commercially are "candled" to ensure that blood spots larger than 1/8 inch aren't sold, but sometimes spots are missed.
In brown eggs, the spots can slip through the cracks more easily because the shells are more opaque, and heavier breeds (the breeds that produce brown eggs) produce more eggs with spots.
Blood spots are also more likely to occur in eggs from birds of “heavier breeds,” says Craig Coufal, associate professor and extension specialist at Texas A&M University Agriculture & Life Sciences Department of Poultry Science. “All brown egg breeds are heavier than a White Leghorn layer,” he told Quartz in an email, referring to the most common egg-laying hen breed in the US.
From Quartz
The same source goes on to say that free-range and organically raised chickens produce more eggs with spots than typical factory farmed eggs.
For cost reasons, some organic egg producers rely more on small grains like oats and barley, which are less expensive than corn. A diet made up of a lot of small grains, says Bruce, can cause blood spots. Plus, hens laying organic eggs can range outside, and are therefore exposed to changing temperatures, says O’Sullivan. That “could potentially elevate the incidence of blood spots in these production systems.”
So, buy white, non-organic eggs to avoid blood spots, but don't let spots keep you up at night. Free-range chickens may have more blood spots in their eggs, but for my own personal ethical reasons, I am loath to recommend against buying free-range.
I only buy free range eggs and have never seen a blood spot on one. Is there something different in the raising of US and UK chickens?
Even in free range eggs, blood spots are pretty rare here too. Candling catches most of them. When I have seen them, they've been in brown eggs.
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88475 | Expired panko bread crumbs
A couple of days ago, I used some expired panko bread crumbs (expired by at least 5 months) for chicken tenders. They had this bad stale oil smell to them and I decided to take a risk. They had previously been opened but I'm very careful in closing them back up and storing them in a cool dry place.
As the first step of the recipe, I lightly fry the panko bread crumbs in a little oil and that removed that bad oil smell instantly. The chicken tenders smelt and tasted fine as well.
I read this and it says that bread crumbs don't spoil, the thing is
though that it definitely smelt pretty bad. So, is the stale oil smell or the expiry something to worry about?
That "stale oil" smell was probably the small amount of fats in the crumbs going rancid and forming butyric acid. I usually do not cook with anything that smells bad, my thought is that it just isn't worth the risk, but risk tolerance varies.
I use panko bread crumbs, but not that often, so they end up sitting around on the shelf for long periods of time. I've never noticed any kind of smell or staleness about them.
You don't say if the package had been previously opened or not. If it was, it's possible that the breadcrumbs were exposed to something in your kitchen which then sat in the package for a long time and ended up giving the bad smell to them.
They had previously been opened but I'm very careful in closing them back up and storing them in a cool dry place. So I don't think they picked up anything from the kitchen.
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45224 | Can I use Basmati Rice for fried rice?
I have some left over boiled Basmati Rice in the fridge and I was wondering if anyone has ever used it to make Chinese Fried Rice given that the recipes generally call for Jasmin rice? Does it have huge flavor differences or should it be ok given that other Asian flavors like Soy sauce and sesame oil add flavor to the dish?
Absolutely you can! It's a popular choice with Chinese and Indian flavor profiles. You can just treat it exactly like you would any other leftover rice. It's a lovely ingredient to work with. The nutty Basmati flavor works beautifully however you choose to season fried rice.
Thanks was just a bit confused coz I thought that Jasmine rice is more suited to Asian cooking and Basmati to Indian and whether its because of their textures and flavors
@Divi Check out what this article about Chinese fried rice has to say. "While Jasmine is a long grain rice, it contains less amylose than regular long grain white rice and cooks up slightly sticky. Basmati rice, which contains a higher percentage of amylose, is a better choice."
@Divi Indian food is Asian food.
@DavidRicherby: Sorry, wrong choice of words. I mean Indian cuisine vs other parts of Asian cuisine
Why does "other parts" of Asia all get lumped together? They're all quite different =.=
I think this is one of those UK/US English things: in US English, "Asian" usually means "East Asian" (Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese, etc), in UK English, "Asian" usually means "South Asian" (India, Pakistan, Bangladesh etc).
@user568458: That's what I meant, thanks for helping with the clarification
@Jolenealaska: It turned out very nice, no problems with the Basmati rice. Can't say it was exactly like a take away but as far as the rice goes, I didn't find any problems.
You definitely can with bashmati rice but jasmine rice is preferred because it relatively smaller and gives out an aroma which suits fried rice. Bashmati rice aroma varies with the quality that you buy from the market. At the same time the greater length of the bashmati makes it stick less compared to that of jasmine rice.
I find the aroma of Basmati superior to Jasmine for fried rice, I also like the larger grains. The protein difference makes Basmati less sticky. All in all, I disagree with the assertion that Jasmine is generally preferred for fried rice, but it's certainly a matter of personal preference.
@Jolenealaska: Yes you are correct to say it's about personal preference. However, fried rice is a popular or trademark dish of South-East Asia esp. Thailand and commonly grown staple there is jasmine rice and therefore it has been used for making fried rice for ages.
Yes! In fact, I try to use anything other than plain white rice when I make fried rice! Any leftover rice is better than fresh, since it fries better after drying out in your refrigerator. (I like to use equal parts white and brown rice, or cook the rice in beer instead of water, to get more depth of flavor in the resulting fried rice.) You can also chop up and add any leftover meat or veggies to the dish - if they're already cooked, add them at the very end so they just warm up.
My secret to really great fried rice is to spread it out in the pan as much as possible and let it cook until the grains on the bottom get a little browned. Then I'll usually toss the rice and let it happen a second time. If you're using a non-stick pan, getting it too hot can be dangerous, so this can take a while on medium heat - if you're using cast-iron, stainless, or carbon steel, you can just turn the heat all the way up and let it get "too hot to stick."
We use Basmati rice all the time for making fried rice as we have basmati leftovers everyday . It is cooked as plain rice everyday at home. Basmati will take on the flavours of whatever you are adding . It is long grained and non-sticky , so it could be an advantage.
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35114 | Can buttermilk be frozen successfully?
Can I freeze unused buttermilk bought at the supermarket for later use? Can it later on be thawed and used safely?
Yes, you can freeze buttermilk.
When thawed, the emulsion will break into solids and whey. This makes no difference for baked goods; you can also use a blender to restore it to a smooth, thicker liquid if needed for applications like salad dressing.
See also:
Video from America's Test Kitchen.
The Kitchn
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40655 | Why don't dry aged/hung sausages go bad?
I was just watching this program on the food network here and they were talking about the Spanish fermented pork sausages. It made me think of sausages that are hung to dry and even though its raw meat (which would go bad very very quickly if not refrigerated properly), it doesn't go bad. Why is that? Is it because no air touches the meat inside the casings?
It is due to a combination of several factor, depending on how the particular sausage was made:
Dry cured sausages contain curing salts, a mixture of regular salt and sodium nitrate (which breaks down into sodium nitrite), which prevents the growth of botulism while the sausage cures.
Meat for dry cures sausage is also often frozen to specific temperatures for prescribed periods of time to kill any trichinosis which may be present.
As the sausage cures, it becomes too dry and concentrated in salt to foster pathogens, as well as too acidic from the action of friendly bacteria, and thus is relatively shelf stable. It may also simply have acid ingredients as part of the initial recipe.
Modern cured sausages may also be subjected to irradiation, cooking, or another "kill step" to satisfy the needs of regulatory agencies, according to the New York Times.
See also:
FSIS
Food Safety News
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39487 | White chocolate mud cake with dark chocolate ganache?
I've been trying to find out if white chocolate mud cake would taste nice with a dark chocolate ganache. This is for a cake that I am making for someone (so I can't make a mistake) and need to find out if this is a good flavor combination. I haven't been able to find out any example of such combination on the internet and was wondering why white chocolate mud cake is always paired with a white chocolate ganache and dark chocolate mud cake with a dark chocolate ganache.
That will work just fine. As long as your ganache recipe is solid and your cake recipe is solid, the combo will be solid.
I am assuming that by mud cake, you mean a tight crumbed chocolate layer cake, almost always iced with ganache.
There are a myriad recipes on the Internet for both regular chocolate, and white chocolate variants, which span the gamut of techniques and ingredients. While they do in fact most often call for a ganache matching the type of chocolate used in the layer, there are variations, such as strawberry frosted white chocolate mudcake, or coffee filled white chocolate mud cake. There is even at least one recipe for white chocolate mud cake with chocolate ganache.
I think you will find two preferences lead to the relative scarcity of white chocolate mud cakes with a chocolate ganache:
Chocolate ganache may overwhelm the delicate flavor of the white chocolate layers
People who like (regular) chocolate tend to really like it, and thus tend to favor chocolate mud cake with chocolate ganache
Nonetheless, there is no other reason not to pair a white chocolate layer with a chocolate ganache if you enjoy the combination; they should work well together, although the ganache will probably be dominant.
I suggest a practice run, perhaps with cup cakes, to test whether the combination works for you before trying it out for your friend.
I used dark chocolate ganache on a white chocolate cake and got excellent reviews
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64489 | How to clean a microwave?
I usually clean my microwave with a surface kitchen spray and was wondering what other tips and tricks do people use to clean their microwaves. Is there anything that should be avoided to not contaminate the food or to not damage the microwave?
You can put a cup/bowl of water(you can also add some vinegar if you don't mind the smell) in there, heat it up to boiling, let the steam out. Then you should let it sit in the microwave without opening the door.
Wait for a few minutes, open the microwave, and wipe off the inside. All that steam should have soften any stains or food pieces left in there.
You may spray some natural cleaners or lemon/vinegar mixtures to wipe off the inside more.
vinegar smells will usually go away after a couple of hours (or a few uses of the microwave)
I also use the steam method above first. However, if it is particularly greasy, as when someone exploded a cheese dish, then the second step is a light scrub with baking soda. Final wipe down with damp papertowel.
You can try putting a damp rag in and microwaving for 10 seconds on high. Then use the rag to clean it. If there are any bits which were still hard to get out, you can repeat this, or nuke the rag for 15 seconds.
I would put a towel with baking soda on it and get it wet and put it in the microwave for 30 seconds and then let it sit for a few minutes. Then wipe it out real good. Repeat as necessary.
What's the point of microwaving the wet baking soda? It won't evaporate.
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25597 | How to substitute oranges in a mango mousse recipe?
I'm looking for a recipe for orange mousse without eggs, but hopefully with gelatine. I've tried to search for some recipes on google but didn't really find anything too good. I have a very delicious recipe for mango mousse that I found on google that I've tried a lot of times. It would be great if someone could guide me with substituting it with orange rind/juice. I know that Orange recipes can become a bit bitter if not handled properly.
Here's the Mango mousse recipe, which is a part of a mango mousse cake.
450 gr. mango
75 gr. sugar
2 tablespoons lemon juice
3 1/2 teaspoons gelatin
500 ml. heavy cream.
Puree the mango flesh with the sugar and lemon juice. Strain to remove fiber from mango.
Put one third of the mango puree into the pot and stir in the gelatin. Let the gelatin soften, and warm over low heat, stirring until dissolves. Remove and add remaining mango puree, and allow to cool. While cooling, whip the cream. Stir in mango into the whipped cream, transfer into containers and chill.
I would never give up a mango mousse for an orange one.
@BlessedGeek: I know, its so so delicious. But I want to try to make orange mousse and fill chocolate cups with it because orange and chocolate work so well together.
You might take a strategy from a orange olive oil cake that I make. Cut about 1/2 inch off the ends of oranges. Then quarter the oranges. Place them in a pot of water, then bring to the boil. Drain and repeat 3 to 4 times. This reduces the bitterness of the pith. Now, add 4 cups of water and 1 cup of sugar to the pot. Add the oranges and bring to a simmer. Cook until they are tender, 30 to 40 minutes, then drain (you can reserve the light syrup for another use). Blend the cooked oranges in a food processor or blender. Use 450 grams in your recipe (strained), eliminate the lemon. Let us know (with a comment, or an answer to your own question if you choose a different approach) if it worked.
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36538 | Why do baking recipes call for instant coffee instead of fresh ground coffee?
I have seen many recipes for cakes, cupcakes, coffee buttercream, etc. that call for instant coffee than the freshly ground/brewed coffee because the instant coffee produces much better flavour. Why is that when fresh coffee is considered much better and flavoursome than instant coffee?
BTW, Tiramisu recipes usually call for brewed coffee
Same reason that recipes call for cocoa powder and not a cup of hot chocolate - it doesn't contain any water, and it's easy to control quantities.
If you used brewed coffee then the recipe would have to be adjusted for water content - assuming that's even possible and you're not adding the instant coffee to other dry ingredients. There may not even be enough water in the recipe to make the adjustment, and if there is, variations on coffee beans/grounds, brewing methods, etc. would make it impractical to estimate the quantity needed.
That's not to say you can't use brewed coffee if you want to, but as a recipe writer it's far simpler to work with fixed/standardized quantities, and brewed coffee is about as far from that as you can possibly get.
Fresh ground coffee requires some sort of brewing process to extract the flavor, generally extended time in hot water. If you just dump some into a cup of warm water, you won't get much out of it - some wet grounds and some slightly coffee-ish water. Same goes for baked goods: coffee grounds won't efficiently release their flavor. If you brew it first, you'll have to add a lot of liquid in order to get enough coffee flavor, likely more than the recipe called for in the first place.
Instant coffee, on the other hand, is designed to dissolve and release all the flavor. Used in baked goods, the same thing happens. Sure, the coffee flavor itself isn't as good as you'd get from real coffee, but you get all of it. It also happens to be much easier!
The main alternative is to use espresso; the flavor is much more concentrated, so a recipe may be able to replace some of its liquid with espresso and get enough flavor out of it, without throwing off the recipe.
When I make coffee to substitute for instant I grind it real fine and make it in a small french press using triple the amount of coffee I would normally use for drinking. I strain it and I reduce the amount of liquids in my recipes. There are things it won't work for such as in chocolates as water will ruin chocolate. I haven't tried brewing it with heated cream. I find I need no more then two tablespoons of the triple strength french pressed coffee to substitute for 1 tsp instant.
For most baking applications, you want something with concentrated flavor that adds minimal moisture and won't change the texture of the finished product. This usually means adding either a coffee extract or instant coffee. For instance, in the cakes and cupcakes, adding brewed coffee would add water and run the risk of making the cake tough, while grounds would make the cake gritty (and probably not actually add that much flavor). In buttercream, adding brewed coffee would involve too much liquid, probably make your frosting separate, and again, grounds would make the frosting gritty.
While fresh coffee has a much better flavor for the purposes of drinking, in most baking applications there are enough other ingredients adding richness, sweetness, etc, that only the base flavor of the coffee will come through. Any more nuanced flavors from good fresh coffee would be lost anyway.
You can get Turkish ground coffee that's so finely pulverized it shouldn't contribute any gritty texture. ... Can't comment on the flavor it might yield.
While Turkish coffee works well in things like cakes, in something like a custard, ganache, frosting, etc, you'd still feel the grains. I've had some buttercream with it that was delicious, but the texture may not be appropriate for all applications.
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45318 | How to travel with a cake overseas?
I am planning to make a white or dark chocolate mudcake and take it from Australia to India in a month's time. I also need to ganache and fondant the cake either before or after the flight. So, I need all the tips and help to help me take the cake safely to India.
So, based on the following, I would be grateful for any tips to help me travel with the cake:
I will be baking a white or dark chocolate cake in Australia where it is currently winter and I'm taking the cake to India where it will be hot and humid. I cannot bake in India as they have no oven there and it is a single tier cake.
I want to ganache the cake and I am really really keen on doing that here in Australia as all my tools are here and its just easy to do it in my kitchen. I think it will be ok as far as the food-safety of ganache goes until I reach India as the temperatures should be cold to cool. Once I reach India, it will be in a warm temperature once I get out of the airport and probably till I reach home, about 1-2 hours.
I will be taking a couple of packets of fondant with me with the basic tools I require to cover the cake.
My ideas are:
Take the ganached cake with me in a hand luggage, like a cake carrier, but I have no idea if that's a good idea.
If I can't ganache the cake here, take the cake in the baking tin and ganache in India.
Design the cake so that if I take a ganached cake and the gaanche loses its smooth finish, the cake still looks good - pebble stone look on the fondant.
I hope this helps answering the question.
I don't know if you are allowed to do it at all. Many countries have limitations on what products can be imported - for example the EU forbids dairy. Check the customs rules before you get into trouble.
@rumtscho: Thanks. As long as I declare it, I should be fine. I should be ok importing the cake, just need to know how to package it
IMO, I would be surprised if you were allowed to pass custom with a cake.
Check with your airline and customs rules of India and Australia.
Super question! I hope that an answer would be also useful for those who, like me, have problems carrying a cake for a 5 minutes bike ride; and it will not simply state that it's impossible due to flight regulations...
@giovanni you could ask that particular question. I am a bit doubtful that the precautions you'd take in an airplane for some number of hours would be the same as on a bike for five minutes.
@Kareen I actually share your point of view; but the web is full of possible strategies for this situation, what I think is missing is an analysis of what could go wrong (which is always a surprise!); and I don't think that the two problems are totally independent...
Very curious: why do you want to TAKE a cake to India? Why not just make it there? I am from India and I haven't generally encountered a deficiency of baking supplies however exotic (exotic wrt India).
@drN: I've already mentioned in the question that I won't have an oven in India, so I can't really bake there.
@Divi Oops, that comment got lost in the text! :)
You might consider asking this question on travel.stackexchange.
If you are allowed to take the cake you can do the following:
1) Ganache the cake after you reach India, preferably indoors as it will melt as you take it along the road.
2) To take the cake along with you during the time of your flight just put it in a ziploc bag and seal it well and it should remain intact and not go bad after you arrive, However, make sure the cake has no form of frosting or anything that has a possibility of melting even remotely.
I definitely am not going to frost it with anything other than ganache coz I know the risks of buttercream, cream-cheese, etc. frostings. I really wanted to ganache before going to India, but I'm open to other ideas
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40895 | What is the difference between microwave and convection microwave combo?
I have been using microwaves for a long time and just a few weeks ago, I saw a convection microwave combo in my office. I didn't know before that it existed.
I saw people putting aluminum foil in it, which I can't use in a normal microwave. How does that work?
I have also heard that we can not put any metal in microwave but the bottom rotating plate itself was made of metal. How does that work?
Regarding heating, I want to know if it still uses microwave technology or a different heating technique, because I have heard it does not use microwave heating. Will convection oven be better for reheating food?
Most of this has been asked and answered, just not all together in one place. See:
What are the pros and cons of Convection Microwave Ovens?
Is it wise to use an aluminum foil in the microwave? Is there a substitute for the aluminum foil?
Why is some metal safe to use in a microwave, but others not?
The combination oven by its very nature has a two different cooking modes: microwave, and conventional heating. Some can do both at the same time, to speed cooking while mitigating the disadvantages (no browning or crisping) of microwave cookery.
The mode you choose to use when reheating food will determine how it gets reheated. Some foods are best done by microwave (such as soups, stews, braises, saucy curries), and some by conventional cooking (fried foods, some breads or toast). This is not to say there is an ideal way to reheat everything: some foods (like pizza or deep fried foods) are notoriously difficult to reheat well.
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29142 | After how long is boiled milk tea consumable?
I made tea with milk in the morning and had it in the evening. Is it is safe? After how much time, does it become unconsumable?
I don't think this question can be answerable. But if you feel unsafe with this (or any other drink/food) simply don't consume it.
Was it refrigerated? That's a huge factor.
@Mong134, it wasn't refrigerated, it was left at room temp. Whats the difference?
http://www.fsis.usda.gov/FACTSheets/Danger_Zone/index.asp
Probably not. Perishable food and drinks are considered unsafe after being in the danger zone (40°F - 140°F, 5°C - 60°C) for more than 4 hours (EDIT: when I was a cook in Massachusetts, four hours was the cut off. Apparently the USDA recommends two hours). And note: that's a cumulative four hours over the course of the foodstuff's lifetime, not four hours in a row. If the milk sits on the counter for an hour, then it's boiled and put into tea which then sits out for three hours, it's considered unsafe.
Leaving food out too long at room temperature can cause bacteria (such
as Staphylococcus aureus, Salmonella Enteritidis, Escherichia coli
*O157:H7*, and Campylobacter) to grow to dangerous levels that can cause
illness. Bacteria grow most rapidly in the range of temperatures
between 40 °F and 140 °F, doubling in number in as little as 20
minutes. This range of temperatures is often called the "Danger Zone."
Keep Food Out of the "Danger Zone"
Never leave food out of
refrigeration over 2 hours. If the temperature is above 90 °F, food
should not be left out more than 1 hour. Keep hot food hot — at or
above 140 °F. Place cooked food in chafing dishes, preheated steam
tables, warming trays, and/or slow cookers. Keep cold food cold — at
or below 40 °F. Place food in containers on ice.
Also crucial to remember when food safety is concerned: FAT TOM. FAT TOM is a mnemonic device which stands for:
Food
Acidity
Time
Temperature
Oxygen
Moisture
All of those things are a factor in the growth of bacteria. With room-temperature milky tea that's been sitting out all day, we've got the full gamut:
Nutrients from the milk (food)
If it's milky tea, it you probably didn't put lemon in it, because let's face it, that'd be gross unless you have a thing for curdled milk.
Time - you said it's been there since this morning
Temperature - at room temperature
Oxygen - I doubt this is space tea or that it was stored in a vacuum.
Moisture - it's a cup of infused water and milk. Doesn't get much more moist than that.
Remember: When in doubt, throw it out.
Good link. You might want to add some information about the danger zone in your answer in case the link ever goes away.
@JoeFish better?
quite a bit, yes. Now it's +1 worthy :)
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38209 | Can I use flavored beers in beer bread?
I'm making beer bread and only have blue moon or leineys lemon shandy. Would these work without a fruity flavor overpowering the bread?
I've made rather good bread with Hoegaarden, so I assume any witbier like Blue Moon would be fine. There is a noticeable flavor contribution, but it isn't overpowering or unpleasant (unless you don't like witbier, I guess). I don't think I'd use the shandy, but it wouldn't necessarily be overpowering - the bread would probably just taste somewhat lemony.
I've made beer bread with Dreamweaver Wheat (gave it a sweet banana-like flavor), Sunshine Pils (a nice savory hoppy flavor), and Guinness (a darker bread with those dark bread flavors). All of them worked out well on their own.
I wouldn't recommend Summer Shandy because it's sort of an "adulterated" beer (part beer, part spiked lemonade) and it would probably be too sweet, but Blue Moon is likely fine.
Acid from the lemon in the Shandy might also slightly throw off the pH balance of the recipe. Stick with Blue Moon.
I made apple beer bread with the apple flavored cider type beer. I put a chopped up apple in it and a cinnamon crumb topping. It is wonderful.
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38275 | How to add banana flavor to my cookies?
I want to add the smell and flavor of banana in my cookies. I'm not sure whether I should substitute APP-flour or butter with banana. Thank you.
Have you considered powdered freeze-dried banana (or grinding up freeze-dried banana yourself) or some sort of banana extract?
powdered freeze-dried banana?? i never though of that but i don't think it will help with flavor, for the smell might be good idea though.
Flavor is smell. Mostly.
Banana adds structure & moisture to baked goods, so you'd actually have to replace some egg, some butter, and some flour. When doing complex substitutions like this, it's usually best to find a recipe that's actually for the kind of cookie you want, in this case banana. Otherwise, you could just add some banana to the recipe as it is and go from there.
Of course, an easier method would be to use banana extract, which would replace the vanilla or other flavoring in your cookie.
You can generally replace oil in muffins and cookies with mashed fruit (applesauce, bananas, etc.) I've had good luck with replacing up to 2/3 of the oil with an equal volume of mashed fruit in muffins without problems.
Butter however is a bit trickier, as it depends on how it's being used in the recipe. If it's melted, it shouldn't be a problem to substitute. If it's creamed, it's going to create a completely different texture.
I'd agree wth sourd'oh : there are plenty of banana cookies out there ... I'd start from one of those, and if you don't like how they come out (eg. too cakey or too chewy), then adjust the recipe for your tastes.
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41131 | How does your hand/stand mixer's speed effect the texture of your cookies?
I've read many recipes asking to mix sugar and butter at medium speed for about 5 minutes. Can I use slower speed and mix it a little bit longer? Will it make any different in the end?
One more thing, when mixing dry ingredients into wet ingredients, does it really make a difference if I use hand mixer instead of a spatula? In the videos, I've seen most of the bakers usually switching to spatula when they have to mix wet and dry ingredients together but some of them mix them in a stand mixer.
Speed would impact in so much as rapid speed helps incorporate air bubbles. These bubbles are important, since they capture and hold CO2 during the rising portion of baking (essentially I like to think about baking in 4 phases: mixing, heating and rising, setting, and cooling).
Usually you use a spatula vs a hand mixer when you A) are using an incredibly dense dough which could damage a mixer, or B) you are concerned about the formation of gluten. Gluten is essentially a good thing in breads, but a bad thing in cakes, and muffins.
Mixing the sugar and butter is largely to aerate your dough. If you mix it at a slower speed, your cookies may have slightly less puff than they would have otherwise, but as long as the butter and sugar are thoroughly creamed, the difference should be minimal.
As for mixing the wet and dry, in theory doing it in your mixer could develop gluten and make your cookies tough. It also has a higher chance of splattering or causing a cloud of flour. That said, cookies have so much fat in them that gluten can't develop much, so as long as you don't overmix, you should be fine.
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43674 | My parchment paper soaked in oil after finish baking cookies
Is this normal? I noticed that sometimes it can get really wet and I can even see the yellow liquid on my paper. However, sometimes it isn't wet at all and I can re-use my paper 2-3 times. What could be the cause of this?
Some recipes will normally leach the fat in the recipe. Some recipes just do it some of the time, other recipes are notorious for doing it all the time. Generally, it's nothing you have done wrong, fats just do that sometimes.
Jolenealaska is correct when we are talking about the difference between recipes. If it happens when you are using the same recipe, it is a sign of a temperature difference. In general, the same recipe will leach more fat if baked more slowly. So if you have a recipe which generally doesn't leach much, but one time it did leach, your oven was probably set too low, or not had not yet reached the preheat setting.
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43744 | How do I get rid of bugs in rice?
Can you please suggest to me how to prevent rice from getting very small black coloured insects, they are really irritating us by spreading total house and bothering my little kid a lot. I am from Hyderabad, India.
Do you have freezer space?
I've had good success with the microwave oven: as worms and eggs contain more moisture than the grains, they'll heat up (and die) much faster than the grains.
If you can, put all grains you buy in impenetrable containers as soon as you get them home, and freeze them. Keeping rice (or any other grain) in the freezer for a full day will help. Keeping the grain in the freezer for a week will kill just about any creepy crawly that's already in the rice, the impenetrable container will keep new visitors out. Glass or hard plastic containers (like tupperware) are impenetrable, Ziploc style bags may not be.
If you don't have room in the freezer for all of a new rice purchase, go ahead and repackage it in the impenetrable containers, and rotate the containers until they have all had at least a full day in the freezer (a week is better).
Get rid of anything that already seems like a breeding ground. Thoroughly go through all of your food storage space, get rid of anything infested, put all you can save into impenetrable containers, and consider a (hopefully) one time use of a pesticide.
Also, the cooler you can keep the stuff that the bugs like, the better. Bugs that are well fed and warm are happy, happy bugs.
One more thing. I don't know if it actually works, but it can't hurt: Try putting a few bay leaves in each container of rice. It's a bit folklore-ish, but the countermeasure has been touted for decades, maybe longer.
I assume you soak the rice before cooking and get rid of anything that floats?
Freezing is a bad idea because although the insects die, their bodies are still in the rice. The bodies don't necessarily float to the surface even if the rice is put into a container full of water. Another one of the answer mentions "sunning", which is a better way, because the insects crawl away.
Since you say you are from India, the best thing will be to sun it for a few hours to get rid of the crawling creatures. Then put some neem leaves in it, which are available all over India (azadirachta indica, for the uninitiated)...also cloves in the rice will help.
I don't know whether putting it in the freezer is a good idea. I have never heard of anyone doing it in India, maybe due to smaller fridges and freezers, non frost free fridges (which produce a lot of water vapour), and of course an erratic electricity supply.
A little sieving wouldn't be out of place either, if you can find the right size mesh.
@WayfaringStranger : sieving rarely helps long-term; even if the bugs are significantly larger than the grains of rice, their eggs aren't.
@Joe: Yes, sure, works for me with corn, but depends on bug size, egg size, and grain size. If sieving eliminates 80% of the problem, you only have to worry about the other 20%.
I don't think the power situation is that much of a problem when using the freezer to kill bugs, but I guess the moisture level could be.
Without access to a freezer or dry ice, you can try this low-tech method:
put rice in a container with a lid
Put a spoonful of baking soda into a bowl, put the bowl on top of the rice in the container
pour a couple of spoonfuls of vinegar into the bowl
shut the container lid
Carbon dioxide produced by the baking soda and vinegar is denser than air and would sink into the rice filling all the gaps between grains. The weevils will eventually suffocate. Once dead, they will dry up. The dried up dead insects should float off when you wash the rice before cooking.
That's a good technique if you can keep the container sealed well enough and long enough to kill all the insects. 12 days is considered long enough. https://ndfs.byu.edu/portals/7/docs/research/long/PETE%20bottles%20paper.091910.pdf
Above research link is 404. New link is here: https://brightspotcdn.byu.edu/d2/f9/fbfb660b4ffbba86ab6461591218/pete-bottles-paper.091910.pdf
In China，we put ginger in the rice container,and it's effective.
The general consensus (from people that have had problems with insect infestation and posted their experiences to various internet forums) seems to be that two kinds of containers are usually effective at keeping bugs of any kind out of dry goods, and that most other types are unreliable:
1) Glass containers with hinge and rubber gasket construction, look at the IKEA Korken series for an example, any reputable brand (IKEA, Fido,...) should do.
2) Hard plastic containers with a gasket and four-sided locking tabs, for examples look at what Lock&Lock, Luminarc Pure Box, or Glasslock makes. These are also available in quite large sizes so you can protect a bag of flour, or a collection of many small bagged items (if none of them is pre-infested).
I do not mean to recommend specific brands here but needed examples for known good container designs, the general theme is: hard materials, airtight and wide rubber or plastic gasket that is forced against the container with pressure, quality brand.
I also have had very good results with screw top glass jars. I've had a larva penetrate into the screw itself and pupate there, but they never reached the contents.
Alot all rice sold in the USA (from China and Japan and similar) has rice weevil eggs in them, but it takes time for them to hatch. If the bugs haven't burrowed out yet, there isn't any problem eating the rice. So, what I do is freeze the rice for 48 hours to kill the eggs (invisibly hidden inside grains of rice), and then seal in half-gallon mason jars for long term storage (I just vacuum-seal the jars, but even that is probably overkill - any air-tight seal should be fine).
However, I also keep rice for everyday use in a common clear plastic ostensibly airtight container, without freezing it, and that usually lasts fine, even several months. Airtight containers seem to greatly extend the lifetime of the rice before the eggs hatch. Eating the eggs are harmless, though I'm sure many Americans would be squeamish to know almost all the rice they've ever consumed had bug eggs in it.
TLDR: Freezing rice for 48 hours in a freezer (just in the store-bought bags they come in), then put the rice into an air-tight container is sufficient to kill the eggs before they hatch and preserve the rice indefinitely (e.g. decades).
Is dry ice available where you live? You can use it to kill bugs in grain. You can also buy oxygen absorbing packets that will kill bugs in sealed containers.
You have to be careful about your choice of container. To kill all the insects, you need to keep the oxygen level below 1% for 12 days. Many 5 gallon buckets don't seal well enough to keep the oxygen out that long. Used plastic soda bottles can be used effectively, but it will take a long time to pour the grain into the bottle using a funnel.
put lots of unpeeled GARLIC CLOVES in the rice container and shuffle it .Rice can be stored for years free from bugs.Before this just sieve the rice to remove existing bugs.
Add Boric Acid ( brought from a medical shop) 400 gms for 50 Kgs is more than sufficient, to the rice and store it. Slowly all the insects will die or leave. In telugu they area called mukka purugu they will leave or die and you can wash out.Even when you wash the rice before cooking these insects float on water and you can remove them. This is also effective for white insects which come in rice. store it in a place where moisture is less and water does not touch rice. I have been practicing this for few years.
Boric acid is an insecticide. In Germany Boric acid has been banned from food use except for kaviar and the upper limit is 4g/kg, not 8g/kg as you write. It can cause kidney damage and may impair fertility and cause harm to the unborn child. As I see it, your suggestion can be dangerous unless you wash your rice very well.
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