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15705
|
What do you use to measure the weight of ingredient?
I don't have a single tools to measure the weight of ingredient.
I came across recipe with different weight:
1/4 cup olive oil
1 pound dried spaghetti
2 tablespoons butter
4 ounces Pecorino Romano cheese, finely grated
1 1/2 teaspoon finely ground black pepper
Salt (optional)
There are already 5 units, how do you measure them separately? If you use a scale, do you translate the unit?
Also, do you have any picture for the size of cup/tablespoon/teaspoon/etc? I have spoons in different size. And cup, to me, is also unknown in size.
I also welcome recommendations of scales and alternative methods to weigh the ingredients.
With a recipe like this, exact quantities aren't terribly important, but if you're serious about cooking, you'll be a lot happier if you just buy some measuring spoons. The weights aren't really the issue, since as the answer says, pasta is often sold by the pound (or maybe 450 or 500 grams?) and cheese is sold by weight too.
The alternative to a scale is to know the volume of items... or how to eyeball it. I know a couple pros who can measure portions to 5% accuracy or better, just by hand and knife. Or, just buy a scale?
@Bob: I agree, a scale is great - I'm just saying it's not stuff like this that you really really need it for.
@Jefromi: Yeah, the only thing here you need a scale for is MAYBE the pecorino romano, if you did the right thing and bought a block of good stuff rather than the pre-grated nonsense at the store. Really there's nothing in this recipe that you shouldn't be able to eyeball and get a good result. Heck, you could just throw in cheese, olive oil, and butter until it looks and tastes good.
Agree with @BobMcGee: sometimes you just add as much as you like. Especially with pasta things are very subjective.
Quick reference: 1 teaspoon = 5 ml, 1 tablespoon = 15 ml, 1 cup = 237 ml (4 cups = 1 quart = just under 1 liter). When volumetrically measuring substances that are largely water, you can generally alternatively use a scale using the conversion 1 ml = 1 g.
@ESultanik - a cup is 250ml in Europe. A US 8oz cup is 227ml, not 237ml - that's a Texan cup. A quart in the UK is two 20oz UK pints. Be careful !
@klpos: Taking a look at wikipedia, there are THREE cup measures! In the British Commonwealths (Australia, Canada, etc) a cup is 250 mL. The standard US cup is 236 mL. The "cup" for nutritional labeling is 240 mL. Kill me now, I'm going back to being the oddball American that bakes in half metric.
@klypos: Yet another reason why everyone should switch to metric! Sorry about that! By the way, I got that measurement by pouring a "cup" full of water from my cup measurer into my metric beaker. I guess the manufacturing standards are also poor!
This is something that really puzzled me when I went living in an English-speaking country. Having grown up in Italy, where recipes tell you "Put 120g of this then add 250g of that", I've always used a scale. The first time I saw I recipe with cups and teaspoons I said: yeah, but I've got 10 types of cups in the kitchen... which one should I be using?
Then someone told me that they were real unit of measure and introduced me to measuring spoons (something that in Italy would be very difficult to come by).
So, going back to your question:
I strongly second @Adam's opinion of buying a digital scale: they're cheap and do the job (personally, I would not spend more than $30-40 on it, but you can find $300 ones if you wish).
If your recipe calls for teaspoons, cups, etc. then you can:
Buy measuring spoons/cups (you can find a complete set for $10, for instance this)
Convert them to g (or whatever your scale measures) using an online calculator. If you google for "teaspoons to grams" or "cups to grams" you'll find plenty.
You can even get an app on your phone. I use this app which works pretty well (I'm sure there's a similar thing for iPhone, but I don't use Apple products, so I can't help there).
If I could do more than one upvote on this, I would.
+1 for making me remember "What kind of cup? Espresso? Breakfast one?
Most people would just use a scale and if your serious about cooking and baking I highly suggest looking for a digital scale that can measure in metric or American standard and is sensitive to the gram. They run about $17.
In this case you are going to have to wing it.Do you have a big soup spoon? Well that's about the size of a tablespoon. Four of those equals 1/4 cup. Or do you have a small water glass. All the ones in my house are one cup so i could use a 1/4 of one of those.
One pound of pasta is easy because pasta is sold in one pound boxes and the cheese is easy because in most American supermarkets grated pecorino is sold in 4 or 8 oz plastic tubs which is why the recipe uses those weights -- it's standard.
Because the obvious answer to this question is a scale, you might want to change the title. What are some alternative ways to measure ingredients?
Edited. Thanks. The size of spoon is too subjective without a picture, I think.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.747687
| 2011-06-23T03:58:42 |
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|
112178
|
What kind of apple fermented drink did I just make?
I got this (dutch) recipe on Twitter a few months back. Translated it's called: apple with bubbles. I made it, and it was nice, simple process, and produced a nice summer style drink. But I was wondering, what did I make, and which parts can I try to vary with?
Translated recipe:
Put in a big jar: 1 apple (small chunks), 1 slice of lemon, 500ml water, 1 tsp honey, 20gr sugar, 1 tsp fennel seeds, 1 cinnamon stick
Cover jar with cheesecloth
For 3-4 days, put it somewhere without direct sunlight, stir/shake it twice a day. (So get some nice fermentation going)
Transfer/filter through cheesecloth liquid into a bottle
Leave the bottle outside the fridge for 2 days, make sure to releave it of pressure.
Put the bottle in the fridge for 2 days minimum. After that you have a week to drink it
So, uhm, what did I make, and which elements are essential for the process?
Some kind of spontaneously fermented cider? can you find the original recipe ?
Lesson two: Applejack ;)
essential elements : apples, time. (I've been known to take the really good fresh cider from farmer's market, swap out the lid with an airlock, and then leave it on my fridge door for a couple of weeks, so it gets lightly shaken regularly)
@Max I have the original recipe, it was a picture of a book. And there was the "apple bubbles" name.
@Joe Thanks for the reminder! (I prefer the early stages of fermentation, when there’s the fizz and slight to medium alcoholic tang.
BTW, if you like baking and are interested in experimenting with wild yeasts - your setup is pretty much what’s done to capture wild yeasts (from the apple peels). I would leave out the spices, just in case.
@Stephie I'm nearing on my 59th sourdough bread, so wild yeast is no stranger to me :) that's also another reason I wanted to try and improve this. But thanks for all the tips everyone, I'll just start fermenting away some of our own apples. Any good tips for calculators for ratios between ingredients?
What you made is a watered down version of a fermented or hard cider - the natural yeasts in the apple produce CO2 and alcohol, the sugar adds a bit of extra food for the yeasts, as does the honey which also contributes to the flavor, like the cinnamon stick and fennel.
In short, you used the spontaneous fermentation like it’s traditional for wine and cider, just with a diluted fruit mash.
For tweaking:
The sugar (or honey) is necessary as you added water to the apple juice. The spices are optional.
I currently have a batch of something quite similar on a shelf, where I first fermented apple peels and cores in water (using up leftovers) and now am fermenting it a second time to make vinegar.
Interesting, so I did made apple cider? Structure wise it tasted more like Limoncello, but not at all that strong.
Also, most recipes for cider come very close to the approach for beer making, with quite an involved process. this was a lot simpler :)
If you want the fizz, it’s a tad more complicated - see beer, some ciders or champagne. But lots of “fermented apple juice drinks“ just let the CO2 escape and then get a stable alcoholic drink with no real effort. Most (Swabian apple wine) means “fill a vat with fresh, unpasteurized juice, add an airlock, wait until the bubbling stopps”. “New wine” as sold in southern Germany means grape juice that has just started to ferment and fizz, consumers can control the sugar vs. alcohol balance by storing the bottle either in the fridge or leaving it at room temperature. See Joe’s comment.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.748114
| 2020-10-18T15:52:18 |
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|
126021
|
Refrigerate Cookie Filling with heavy whipping cream?
Is it necessary to refrigerate cookies that have been filled with icing of heavy whipping cream, butter, and milk chocolate chips?
Your ingredients imply that you are working with some version of ganache (or truffle filling).
The lighter kinds, with a lower chocolate and higher milk or cream content will need refrigeration. Very high-chocolate versions can be held at cool room temperature for a limited time.
Without further examining the recipe and method, food safety considerations mean we can only answer your question with:
Yes, the cookies need to be stored in a refrigerator.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.748398
| 2023-12-07T23:56:53 |
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|
66471
|
Adding 'swirls' to savoury bread dough
I'd like to make a mustard bread that I can get at my local coffee shop:
It's got mustard swirls in it but is a normal loaf shape. When and how do you incorporate savoury sauces like mustard or pesto, and are there any tricks I should know about?
Looks like you've protected your tweets. Would you like to re-upload the image here?
Any additional ingredients should be incorporated after the first proofing.
So after your bread has been set aside to rise in a warm place and doubled in size, knock it back to release the carbon dioxide, then add in your mustard any way you want.
It might be worth rolling out the dough, spreading the mustard along the inside, and then rolling up the dough and cutting it into small pieces to create the swirls.
The bread should then be shaped as you want it and left to rise for another 30-45 minutes or so. After all this it should be good to go.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.748587
| 2016-02-13T15:23:07 |
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|
56160
|
How to remove residual flavours from, e.g., a coffee press
I'm considering using a glass coffee-press jug as a mixing vessel for other drinks but I'm worried about residual coffee flavour even after using normal detergent.
Is this something I should be worried about, and how would you clean the pot so as to remove any residual flavour?
What material(s) are we talking about and do you intend to use just the carafe or the other parts as well?
Thanks for replying, Stephie - just thinking of the glass jar itself. Not the filter part.
Bleach it with chlorine bleach.
vinegar should do it, no ?
The glass jar should be mostly residue-free due to the smooth surface.
Sometimes slight traces remain when the jar is hand-washed but the harsher detergents usually used in dishwashers should get rid of them easily. (Side note: Don't do this to the coveted stained teapot of a true tea aficionado...)
The other parts are a different issue: often, they are not dishwasher safe and there are plenty of tiny nooks and crannies where coffee residue might "hide" and cling to and impart the characteristic coffee flavour - especially in combination with alcohol, which acts as a solvent.
If you are planning on using only the jar for your martinis, run it trough the dishwasher, give it an extra rinse with clear water just to be sure there is no trace of detergent and cheers!
Glass is very non-porous and should generally not retain any flavor or odor. A good wash with hot soapy water and a very good rinsing should take care of the issue.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.748716
| 2015-03-28T20:01:59 |
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|
56523
|
Bread has tough, crunchy crust but is underbaked in the middle - how to fix?
I've been attempting to make white bread using a recipe from my grandmother. However, since she used to bake this bread every weekend and could probably have done it in her sleep, when she wrote down the recipe she was very vague. Recipe is as follows:
In a large bowl:
4 cups boiling water
3-4 tablespoons shortening
6 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon salt (this may be left out)
In a medium bowl:
2 cups cold water
2 cups hot water
1 1/2 cups powdered milk
In a small bowl:
3 tablespoons yeast
2 teaspoons sugar
1 cup water 110-115 degrees
Let yeast dissolve and begin action. Mix all ingredients in large
bowl, making sure hot liquids have cooled enough before adding
dissolved yeast. Add flour (not too much) and beat with electric
beater for a few minutes. Add enough flour to make a firm dough. Knead
approximately 8 minutes. Grease large bowl and place dough in bowl.
Grease top of dough. Let rise. Punch down and shape into loaves.
Grease pans and place loaves in pan and grease top of loaves. Let
rise. Bake at 350 degrees approximately 30-40 minutes.
I usually halve the recipe since it results in a lot of bread otherwise. When halved, I add roughly 8-9 cups of flour (I have a flour scoop that picks up just over 1 cup flour) into the dough before rising, then another 2-3 cups that get mixed in while I'm trying to knead and using flour to keep the dough from sticking to everything.
One of the problems I'm having is crust vs interior doneness. Every attempt so far has resulted in a very thick crust which is either painfully chewy, extremely dry and crispy, or both; while the inside of the loaf is doughy and undercooked.
My grandmother's oven was 40-50 years old, beneath a gas stove, and not in the best of shape, so I wouldn't be surprised if it wasn't actually baking at 350 degrees. Also, she lived in Michigan while I live in the Pacific Northwest (basically at sea level), so that's probably also not helping things.
What should I do differently to get bread that's fully baked in the middle, without a crust that's difficult to chew?
350 degrees as an oven temperature is very reasonable @thatgirldm, it's probably not that which is your trouble. It sounds to me as if your dough does not have enough water content or is underproofed, however if you post your recipe and method you'll get better answers.
Welcome to the site! Not wanting to rip off your Granny's recipe, we could nevertheless use it to figure if it's really only the oven settings. Perhaps you could post your version here, including how you prepare it? I know it sounds like a lot of superfluous typing, but sometimes it's the small details that count.
Oops! Okay, I don't have the recipe on me atm (I'm at work), but I'll add it when I get home. In the meantime, it's something like 3-4 cups water, 3/4 cup powdered milk, a few tablespoons sugar, a tablespoon salt, about one packet of yeast, and "enough" flour.
Also, @GdD: what does "underproofed" mean? I don't know any of y'all's fancy baking terminology. :)
About what happens during proofing, see this post, although it deals with another question.
@thatgirldm, proofing also known as rising. My grandmother's recipes often called for "some" flour, or omitted critical things like salt and sugar, so I share your pain.
This sounds like a yeast bread. How experienced are you with making yeast breads?
@derobert Not experienced at all. :) I've tried this recipe maybe 4-5 times so far? And had lots of problems every time...
@thatgirldm Once you've edited in the recipe, there are a couple of bread bakers around the site (myself included), we'll surely have some suggestions. Before that, I'm going to suggest starting with a recipe from a cookbook, the Internet (especially YouTube is nice because you can see them make it), etc.—that is detailed and complete, and tells you ingredient amounts (especially flour) by weight. That way you can learn what dough should feel like, how long it to knead it (longer than you'd ever expect!), how it changes as you knead it, how to shape it, etc.
@thatgirldm, that seems to be 9 cups or liquid in total. Now the essential question: How much flour do you typically use? Weight would be ideal, volume is ok, too. We need to calculate the flour-to-liquid ratio. What kind of flour?
How many loaves are you making? I'd think you'd get somewhere between 9 and 12 out of that much water... (Full answer coming later, no time right now).
@Stephie: Added! I use generic white bread flour.
@derobert: When I halve the recipe, I get 3-5 loaves depending on how big I make them/how well I've managed to get the dough to rise. I haven't actually made a full batch successfully, but since my grandmother used this to make a week's worth of bread for a family of 13, 9-12 loaves sounds about right.
First off, there is a way bakers measure the proportions of ingredients that is pretty unique to bread—everything is measured relative to the amount of flour by weight. A ratio of 0.6 (or 60%) means if you use 10oz of flour, you use 6oz of that other ingredient.
There are typical ranges for these. For example, salt will typically be 1–2%, yeast (depending on type of yeast) ≤2%. Water will be between 55–85% (the low end is bagels, the high end is various artisan rustic breads), and typically 60–66%. Note that high gluten flours (like bread flour) soak up more water than lower gluten flours (like all-purpose), so they'll need a few % more water. The more water the looser and tackier a dough becomes (and, ultimately, becomes a batter instead with enough water.)
Please forgive me for working the rest of this in metric, it's what I normally use to bake. Yes, despite being American… The math is so much easier without having to do lb→oz, etc. conversions.
Your recipe has 9 cups of water, which is ≈2130g. It calls for a firm dough, and you're using bread flour, and hand kneading (which means you'll add a little more in from dusting as you knead) so I'd go with around 62%. That'd be 3435g of flour (2130÷0.62). [That's 121 oz, or 24 c. if you insist.] We can now use that to compute the baker's ratios of the other ingredients:
3T of yeast, according to an online converter is ≈29g. So that's 0.85%, which is reasonable.
3–4T shortening is ≈1–1.5%. Shortening (or fat in general) tends to make bread less chewy (think of a good baguette and how that has a chewy toughness to it—shortening lessens that.)
1½ c. powdered milk is about 100g, about 3%.
6T + 2t sugar is about 85g, or 2.5%.
1T table salt is 17g (0.5%). There is another gram or so in the powdered milk. Salt slows down yeast, and does various other things, but mainly it's for flavor.
Those all look pretty reasonable, so this recipe should work. (Personally, I'd suggest doubling the amount of salt in there, for flavor.) Also, it's possible that all-purpose flour might actually work better than bread flour, since you're not going for chewy.
Now, for some ways it can go wrong:
You're putting a lot of warm ingredients in your dough. Starting with boiling water (I have no idea why, honestly. Maybe to melt the shortening?). Then you add hot water, and finally some cold water. Unless "cold water" means "ice", the resulting mix is still going to be hot. You must not heat the yeast above 130°F. That will kill them pretty quickly. I'd interpret that "cooled enough" step to mean 115°F at most.
If you measure your flour by volume (cups), that's error-prone (you can easily put anywhere from 4–6oz/cup, depending on how you measure). A $20 digital scale is far superior and quicker, too.
When you start kneading this, it's going to be tacky and stick, at least once you get all the flour mixed in. Try not to add too much additional flour while kneading—use only the minimum required to make it handleable. As you knead, even without adding flour, it will get better. You can use a bench scraper (or a pie server or even a table knife in a pinch) to help pull it off the board if it sticks.
If at some point during kneading it becomes stretchy and difficult, let it rest for a few minutes.
This dough should double (and no more) before you knock it down. Then you shape it (and there is a technique to that), and it should double again in the loaf pans. Be patient.
When done baking, the center should be at least 190°F, maybe even 200°F. If it's under 190°F, put it back in the oven. Feel free to turn down the oven if its browning too much. (Though I think your times are reasonable.)
Finally, almost all bread has a crispy crust after cooling fresh out of the oven. Once it cools, place it in a plastic bag for a few hours—that'll soften the crust.
Got a chance to try the recipe using this advice - it works! Thank you! :)
Europe uses weight to measure ingredients rather than cups.
Edited; expanding on answer.
The two most common issues for bread is not enough water and not enough proofing. Although there are many ways to get there it all revolves around not having enough CO2 in bread because of under-expansion. 90% of the time root causes is due to a lack of moisture during one of the steps...
So dry or tough bread can be the result of 4 or 5 things;
Not doing a wet sponge stage; very often overlooked; even by many chef's. Letting the flour autolyse is CRITICAL; keeps the flour from all of sudden changing from a perfect dough to a hard dry rock, unpliable and fails to rise correctly. Typically this happens 30 minutes in or right as you let it sit for the first proofing. Yeast require a wet and pliable environment to do its work. Better to go with too much water then not enough!
Combine your ingredients and 1/2 to 3/4 your flour to the bowl; stir until "lightly mixed" and let sit covered for 30 minutes. After 30 mins slowly add the rest of the flour in; typically while stirring.
Dough worked too much; gluten has been broken down and made the dough to tough; this results in bread that will not rise. By hand; not an issue; electric mixer can ruin bread dough very quickly. Be very careful when using the giant kitchen aid to beat up the dough.
Under worked dough; gluten has not stretched or broken down at all; dough cannot trap any CO2 bubbles. Bread turns on hard and grainy when cooked and is very hard to work with (falls apart).
Most recipes call for second stage kneading to be done by hand.
Dead yeast; always make sure your yeast is young and healthy; don't use those packets that have been sitting for 4 years in cupboard. If you have borderline yeast; give it extra time to proof (20 mins becomes hours). There are main strains of yeast out there; find a brand you like and always use the same for "expected results". Playing with different strains can change taste, consistency and flavor profile of bread (often over-looked).
Over risen or under risen dough; usually due to misstep above or your first and second proofing times are wrong.
Just for clarity, I'm looking less for a soft/no crust and more for a way to get the inside sufficiently cooked without completely overcooking the outside.
More then likely its in the proofing and the flour is absorbing liquid when you start baking; as others mentioned.
Looking at recipe 3 things i would try;
After mixing in bowl; let sit for 20+ mins. I would hold back on on at least half the flour and add after the mixture has sat. Should be verrryy wet. Base mixing should be done on low and only enough to get all ingredients together.
First rise should be 20 minutes; second rise 1 hour.
Side note; make sure your yeast never touches anything above 115F.
Could you expand on that a little and make that an answer? (Grr, for some reason I can't @ zerobane?)
@thatgirldm You can't @zerobane because the site considers it superfluous; comments on an answer are by default to whoever wrote the answer. Yeah—somewhat silly, and results in confusion about why suddenly @-TAB doesn't work anymore. (Even after years of using SE sites, that one still catches me!)
just edited my original response inline; i have always done 3 basic steps for both my breads and pizza dough;
Autolyse / wet sponge for 20 mins
proofing for 20 mins
proofing for 1 hour
Also; sifting does make a difference; I would try 1 loaf with and 1 without using the recipe; side by sides are always fun.
I notice that the recipe calls salt optional. Have you been using the tablespoon of salt? If not, I recommend you add it. Salt controls the fermentation rate of the yeast and strengthens the gluten protein. Bread made without it will be dense, with a very hard crust.
Otherwise, it sounds like your dough isn't receiving a long enough rise, or you may have used old yeast. Letting the dough rest to absorb the liquid, as others have suggested, may help. It's possible that your oven temperature is too low, but I'd try replacing your yeast and using a longer rising period before changing the temp.
Oh, it just occurred to me: how hot is the water you're using? When I first started baking bread I used water that was too hot--which killed some of the yeast.
I am adding the salt, yes. Maybe I should use more? I use fresh yeast (or at least freshly bought with a far-in-the-future expiry date), and after one time with too-hot water killing the yeast, I'm always careful about water temperature. :)
One reason for a hard crust and uncooked inside could simply be that fan ovens blow hot air?
The hot air will dry and bake the crust top but the tin will keep the hot air off the sides and base for quite a while so the inside is slow to heat up!
It's not really much use trying to bake with a lid or cover on bread as that merely makes the steam condense onto the crust and make it really tough.
Perhaps a shield of tin foil over the loaf on the side near the fan might help, but basically the problem is trying to get the inside hot without the outside getting very hot and very dry.
A fanless oven with heater bars at the bottom would be OK by heating the tin base first so the inside gets hot and rises.
Get a instant read Probe Thermometer. The probe has a wire connected to it so you can monitor the temp without opening the oven door. Stick the probe in 20 minutes after you put the loaf in. they cost 15 dollars.
Bake until center is 210 degrees. Take the guesswork out of it.
If you think the top is browning to much cover in with tin foil at the end of the bake.
And what the guy said about boiling water..... never heard of using boiling water in a bread recipe.
You want your dough to be about 80 degrees when you start the first ferment. Another reason for a instant read thermometer.Temps are so crucial in bread making.
Good luck.
Does the fact that you never heard of anyone using boiling water in a recipe make it invalid? The author clearly recommends "making sure hot liquids have cooled enough before adding dissolved yeast". But using hot water to dissolve fat, sugar and salt is feasible, albeit not necessary IMHO. The influence of hot water on yeast has been discussed extensively. And just for the sake of completeness: Not all of our readers are from the US, many use Celsius for temperature. It would be super nice to give both temperatures, but at least write "F" or "C", please, we have beginners reding this, too.
You’d be absolutely shocked to hear about tangzhong then… pre-cooking some of the flour in boiling water before mixing it with the rest of the ingredients.
Increase your oil and Make sure you have enough flour, your dough should make a kissing sound when you take your hand away from the side. Try baking at 400 degrees F for 30 minutes. Put the rack so your loaves are right in the middle of your oven. This works for me. Hope it turns out for you too.
|
Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.748923
| 2015-04-09T15:18:30 |
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|
115402
|
Is it safe to smoke a 20lb turkey?
I just spatchcocked a 12 lb turkey, smoked it in temperature around 225-275 F (107-135 C) for about 3 hours. I did it in a kamado joe classic 3 with SloRoller. It came out amazing. Fully cooked, tender and flavorful
I’m wondering
Is it possible to do the same thing with a 20lb turkey?
Some random sources I googled suggested that that’s crossing into the “danger zone” anything above 12lb.
The main concern with smoking large whole turkeys is that heat may not get into the cavity, so the inside may not get up to temperature fast enough. When you spatchcock a turkey the heat can get to both sides evenly, so you take away this problem and a 20lb turkey should be fine. Kamado Joes (I have a Classic 2) have excellent heat circulation so I wouldn't expect you to have a problem with a whole one, but spatchcocking will give you better results.
Yes, you can smoke a 20lb turkey. I have never had to spatchcock one, but I do not have a rotator or one of the premium smokers mentioned either. I have a simple "locker style" smoker (vertical with a propane burner). That said, I never have any problems with even the largest bird. My caveat here is that I leave the body fully open (i.e. no stuffing).
The key here is to not aim to fully cook the bird in the smoker itself. I typically smoke it at about 4 hours at 225 F. That should bring the bird to about the 150 F range. I then heat the oven to 400 F and pull the bird out into a baking pan. Cover the top with foil (leave the meat thermometer in) and put the bird in the oven for another 15-30 mins. That should bring it to your desirable 160 F.
I've done this for several years and get a perfect bird every time.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.750418
| 2021-04-25T18:43:03 |
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|
113097
|
I think my chocolate fudge is seizing?
new here and amateur home cook.
I'm trying new fudge recipes and got one down that works extremely well when I'm not using chocolate. When I use chocolate, it... Seizes I think. It becomes crumbly without becoming crystalized.
Recipe is:
Bring 6oz. evaporated milk and 1.5c sugar to a boil until 224°F (I live a mile above sea level)
Pour it onto a greased pan (greased with vegetable or canola oil) that has been sitting in the freezer and throw that into the freezer asap
In a stand mixer bowl, add 5-7oz. of morsels (semisweet chocolate, butterscotch, peanut butter, etc), 6 tbs. of room temp unsalted butter, pinch of salt, and dash of vanilla extract. Set aside.
When the syrup is at 120-130°F, pour into the bowl with stuff in it and mix on low until combined. With the peanut butter morsels, I was able to let it go for a while and made some night light and fluffy fudge.
The chocolate fudge, however, comes out crumbly for some reason. I use basic semisweet morsels. One instance was clearly the chocolate seizing; when I pressed it into a pan, all the fat from the butter seeped to the surface like a sponge. Another time, I put the butter in the pan with the milk and sugar, and it still became crumbly through the fat didn't seep out almost at all.
Help? I've tried a lot of testing on the sugar syrup up to this point practicing the recipe and have since had the chocolate fudge attempts fail everytime.
EDIT: Solved! I simply pre-melt the chocolate morsels, make sure the syrup reaches 50°C/120°F, mix together and incorporate butter after the syrup and chocolate are mixed fully! It's been consistently working well.
Are you saying this isn't a chocolate fudge recipe? If it is, can you give the source if online?
It is, it's one I've cobbled together from looking at tons of recipes and looking into the science behind sugar crystal formation.
You mention looking into sugar crystal formation, but have you looked into chocolate crystal formation? Chocolate has crystals as well, and I wonder if its the "tempering" of the chocolate here that's getting you into trouble. 120-130F is a bit hot for chocolate.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.750575
| 2020-12-11T22:01:06 |
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|
117888
|
Are cremini mushrooms and chestnut mushrooms the same thing?
They look the same. This BBC Good Food article describes the chestnut mushroom in very similar terms to how this Epicurious video describes the cremini mushroom.
Are there actually any differences between the two, or is the former the UK term and the latter the US term?
Possibly.
The fungus Agaricus bisporus goes by many names. There seem to be (at least) two cultivars, one of which is white when immature, and the other brown.
When immature and white, this mushroom may be known as common mushroom, white mushroom, button mushroom, cultivated mushroom, table mushroom, and champignon mushroom (or simply champignon).
When immature and brown, it may be known variously as Swiss brown mushroom, Roman brown mushroom, Italian brown mushroom, cremini/crimini mushroom, chestnut mushroom
(Agaricus bisporus, Wikipedia - emphasis added)
That same article also notes that there is another mushroom that's commonly called "chestnut mushroom," Pholiota adiposa.
When I search for "chestnut mushroom," more of the references are to this latter species, Pholiota adiposa, than Agaricus bisporus. So, according to these people, "chestnut mushroom" and "cremini" are not the same.
Personally, I wouldn't put much stock in that BBC article which has two separate entries for "white mushroom" and "closed cap" which appear to describe the same mushroom (Agaricus bisporus). And of course, portabello is also Agaricus bisporus, although, being matured, they might reasonably be considered a different "type."
they are the same mushrooms species.
The white button mushroom is the younger one, the brown/chestnut/cremini is more mature, white portobello mushrooms are the most mature.
I don't see much differences between the white button mushrooms and the chestnut mushrooms as I will cook them down a lot.
For raw applications, I prefer the white ones.
I rarely use portobello, so I cannot comment on them.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.750757
| 2021-11-17T21:34:22 |
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|
113510
|
Safe to cook with alcohol
I want to cook with wine as the recipe I want to make calls for it. However I cannot have any alcohol in me because I have to drive and my country calls for a 0 BAC.
The recipe uses 750ml of wine, 1 cup of water and no other significant source of fluid. Most of the cooking time the dish is supposed to be covered tightly to reduce boil-off and around 250ml of the wine is only added 10 minutes before the end.
Will all of the alcohol evaporate in the 2 hours it simmers for? Or is there an alternative to using Chianti.
Recipe:
Ingredients
3 to 3 1/2 lbs boneless chuck roast, trimmed and cut into 2-inch pieces
2 1/2 tsp kosher salt
1 TB olive oil
1 bottle (750ml) Chianti
1 cup water
1 onion, thinly sliced
3 carrots, peeled and sliced into 1/2-inch thick rounds
3 stalks celery, sliced into 1/2-inch pieces
10 cloves garlic, chopped
4 sprigs fresh rosemary
2 bay leaves
1 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1 TB unflavored gelatin powder (I use Knox brand)
1 TB tomato paste
1 tsp anchovy paste (don’t skip this)
2 tsp cornstarch
Steps
Pat dry cut-up beef well, using paper towels.Toss beef with salt in a bowl and let stand at room temp 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 350F with rack on lower middle position.
In a large Dutch oven, heat oil over medium high heat until starts smoking. Add half of the beef in a single layer and cook until well browned on all sides, about 8 min total, reducing heat if it begins to burn.
Stir in 2 cups wine, water, onion, carrots, garlic, rosemary, bay leaves, pepper, gelatin powder, tomato paste, anchovy paste, and all remaining beef. Bring to a boil and immediately reduce to simmer. Cover tightly with foil, followed by lid (helps retain moisture.) Transfer to hot oven and cook until beef is tender, about 2 hours.
In a bowl, whisk the remaining wine with the cornstarch until dissolved. Add to the pot of braised beef. Place pot on stovetop and bring to a boil over medium high heat; immediately reduce to simmer. Simmer (low boil) uncovered, stirring,10 minutes. Should be somewhat thickened. Season with additional kosher salt and pepper to taste, if needed.
Serve with crusty bread, rice, noodles, or potatoes.
This is the closest/oldest/most generic relevant question I could find: Cooking away alcohol (link is to the relevant answer)
Does this answer your question? Cooking away alcohol
As a general rule, the answer by Chris H is accurate. Most recipes that involve wine only use a small amount and typically involve cooking in a way that causes most of the alcohol to evaporate (or combust if it’s a flambé), and in general they will have no more impact on BAC than a cup of fruit juice would. In cases where it really matters you can indeed get de-alcoholised wines with very low %ABV specifically for cooking. The same (other than the de-alcoholised aspect) is usually also true of many recipes that involve other forms of alcohol (or, in some cases, you can find alcohol free versions of the same recipes).
The particular recipe you linked, however, is not such a recipe. There are two reasons that it will be an issue:
The stock is more wine than water by a ratio of 2:1 (the recipe calls for one cup of water for the stock but uses two cups of wine for the stock). This by itself is significantly more wine than is normally found in most recipes that call for wine (most have a ratio less than 1:5).
The way this is cooked (covered by first a layer of foil and then a lid) is intended to retain moisture. It will be just as effective at retaining the alcohol content as well, which means the alcohol will not ‘cook-off’ as is normally the case with recipes that call for wine.
This means that the stock, after cooking and only factoring in liquid components, will probably still have a %ABV of about 2/3 of that of the wine, probably somewhere around 7-9%, which is actually higher than many beers. Given this, if you really want to make this recipe, you will need to find a de-alcoholised wine that is equivalent to a Chianti (given that the recipe does not list a particular variety of Chianti, it’s probably intended to use a Chianti Classico).
oooh, good point about the recipe
That's a good take, +1. I still reckon you could reduce and dilute the wine on its own beforehand, but with so much, you'd need to simmer it for a long time to be confident. I'd say that might spoil the flavour, but of course it gets cooked for a long time anyway
It's actually 3:1, 750ml of wine and 250ml water - only 500ml wine is intitially added, but the rest is added at the end.
“or combust if it’s a flambé” – I doubt that. Flambé requires higher-concentrated alcohol, and while some of that is burned there's enough time for some to seep deeper in the food, but not boil off like in long-cooking dishes with wine.
I think a substantial edit is in order here - it's definitely not true that most recipes will cook off most of the alcohol. See https://cooking.stackexchange.com/questions/659/cooking-away-alcohol/672#672, for example. It's true that, as you note, this specific recipe cooks away much less than others, but the amount of cooking that's required to cook away most of the alcohol (e.g. boiling uncovered for a couple hours or more) is also not at all common. (See also Chris H's answer on this question.)
In general, we can assume that it will never boil off to zero. By a combination of reduction and dilution we can get to undetectable levels, less than in ripe fruit and some breads. The "zero BAC" requirement has to be able to handle people eating normal foods, so tends to have some margin, just not enough to have a drink.
To do this you'd simmer the wine on its own until significantly reduced, top up with water to the original volume, then use. The amount of wine per portion in many dishes is low anyway - not in everything of course, but there's often more stock than wine, further diluting it.
If this doesn't go far enough, de-alcoholised wines vary with jurisdiction but are often 0.5% or even 0.05%, the latter being less than some fruit juices, and less than vinegar (link to a recent answer of mine, where I discuss a relevant scientific paper). The alcohol in those has been removed by a more effective process than simple simmering.
source for "alcohol will remain in food": https://www.foodnetwork.com/how-to/packages/food-network-essentials/cooking-wine-does-alcohol-burn-off Basically, for most cooked food, assume that it retains about 50% of the original alcohol content.
@FuzzyChef And for OP's recipe, it's probably more like 90% of the (high) original alcohol content.
You are quite safe cooking with alcohol as long as you are not using ridiculous amounts and it goes in before you cook the food (simmer/boil/flambe etc.) and not after. The ethanol component of alcohol evaporates at 78°C (173°F), while simmering happens between 85°C and 96°C(ish) so the ethanol will have boiled off.
Edit for detail - The physics of cooking (and the rest of the universe) mean that the temperature of a mixture will not significantly exceed the state change temperature of one of the components of that mixture while sufficient quantities of that component exist in a state that can absorb the excess available energy. This is because the energy required to cause a state change is significantly higher than the energy required to raise temperature so all liquid alcohol at 78°C will become alcohol steam at 78°C before any water content can become 79°C.
This is just a complicated and long winded way of saying that if you have temperature of 85°C or greater in an unpressurized and ventilated environment, then you can be 100% certain that you have no liquid alcohol in that environment. The extra few degrees are to allow for localized variations in temperature and pressure. A thick gloppy tomato sauce is going to have higher pressures which increase the state change temperature then a thin white wine reduction. If your environment is partially sealed, then there is a risk that your steam may contain alcohol molecules which can condense back into your food (affecting its flavor). This is why it is normal after adding alcohol to return to a boil on the stove before putting a lid on and simmering gently. This means the steam in the pot is clear of alcohol.
Would a chemist be able to find alcohol molecules in your food? Probably yes, if they were careful. Would a chemist or police officer be able to find alcohol molecules in the blood of someone who ate your food? No, not at levels above normal background in the human body.
This reasoning is flawed; similarly you could say that water evaporates at 100°C and so any food cooked higher than that temperature contains no water. As @ChrisH said in that answer the ethanol content will reduce but will not go down to zero even at a relatively high temperature.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.750933
| 2021-01-01T08:52:51 |
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|
39825
|
What is the magic time and temperature for stewing meat and vegetables?
I made an oxtail stew in the crockpot/slow-cooker today, and 6 hours later I added the vegetables (carrots, onions, celery) which was also one hour before dinner time. Unfortunately, two hours later, the vegetables were still tough and crunchy, which earned me a reprimand from my wife for dinner being late. :-(
The reason why I didn't add in the vegetables from the beginning is because I didn't want the vegetables to be overcooked and too soft.
Motivated by the desire to earn praise rather than rebuke from my darling, what is the right time and temperature for stewing meat and vegetables? Is the solution to first sweat the vegetables?
What I have found so far:
According to Rose Prince (see link), the magic time and temperature for a beef stew recipe is 7 hours at 80°C = 175°F
According to What is the lowest possible temperature for stewing meat?, vegetables should be done at 80°C-95°C
While point (1.) tells me how long to cook the meat, I'm not sure based on point (2.) whether that will leave the vegetables undercooked or overcooked.
Isn't the whole point of the celery, at least, that it should be crunchy and provide textural variation?
@PeterTaylor No, I would like the stew to be like comfort food, so that the vegetables including the celery are soft.
I suspect this question does not have an answer. How long it takes vegetables to cook will depend a great deal on what vegetables you're cooking, what shapes and sizes you cut them into, how soft you like them, and what temperature setting you're using on your slow cooker.
If you are going to wait until an hour before serving you definitely have to sweat the vegetables, you could also add them to the stew earlier, like half way through the cooking of the meat. In a pinch I have also put vegetables in some water with seasoning in the microwave after about 4 or 5 minutes, the will be softer, then add to the stew. I also don't think that adding the vegetables with the meat for the whole cooking time is a problem, the vegetables take on all that flavor that the meat gives up.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.751674
| 2013-11-28T02:20:01 |
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|
97614
|
Can I turn a betty crocker angel cake mix into a normal sponge?
I have a betty crocker angel food cake mix and we don't like the texture. Our usual box cake mix is the French vanilla which is super tasty and light and white. We love this mix.
My question is: can I substitute some of the water that is needed to make up the angel cake mix with and egg or two to make it more like a cake batter, as it's too much like meringue for us.
One of the problems with living on a sphere is that one person's night is another person's morning. Stack Exchange isn't designed for "I'm in a hurry" answers, I'm afraid.
Angel food cake basically is meringue (with a little bit of flour folded in)
Angel food cake is a very different type of cake from a standard vanilla sponge cake it's mostly egg whites and sugar, other cakes have more flour, so if you want to try and modify it I'd be thinking more flour and maybe some butter.
If it was me I wouldn't bother though. It may be possible to modify the mix, but you'd have to reverse engineer the recipe from the box ingredients for both mixes, then work out the quantities to make one into the other. That is making big assumptions, and it's unlikely you'll get a good result without a lot of trial and error. It's a lot of work for little return when you can just go buy another box that you do like - enough work that you may as well make a cake from scratch rather than using a mix in the first place.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.751881
| 2019-04-21T18:11:46 |
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|
120151
|
White bread without the "yeasty" or "bready" flavor
I'm trying to recreate a very specific brand of white bread from my parents' hometown, which isn't available outside about a 60-mile radius since the bakery doesn't use preservatives. But it's DANG good, and I'd like to be able to make something similar for myself in between trips to visit my parents.
The things I know about the bread are:
VERY pale, despite apparently using wheat flour - pure white inside and a very light tan on the crust
Extremely light and airy inside, with a fairly open crumb
Delicate, almost sweet flavor, with none of the usual "yeasty" or "bready" flavors in typical white breads
Makes a very lightweight but sturdy and crispy toast
Supposedly made from a German recipe from 1852, unchanged except for "the removal of lard" (I don't know what, if anything, replaced the lard)
The ingredients listed on the packaging are Enriched wheat flour, water, sugar, yeast, buttermilk, shortening (soybean and palm oils), malt, salt
I've made a few attempts at recreating the recipe, but so far haven't had any luck. The main problem is that no matter what I do, I can't eliminate the "yeasty" or "bready" taste. The closest I've gotten is by replacing half the water in a standard white bread recipe with buttermilk, substituting lard for shortening, and substituting all the sugar except what starts the yeast, with half the amount of malted milk powder (I've ordered proper diastatic malt powder but it'll be a while before it arrives).
However, among other issues, that recipe still results in the distinct "yeasty" or "bready" taste that I'm trying to avoid. I found this question which asks about how to increase the yeast flavor in bread, but I'm not yet good enough at bread science to reverse the answers.
How can I remove the "yeasty" flavor from my bread, ideally while also maintaining the characteristics listed above?
Maybe explore milk-bread recipes as a foundation and tweak from there?
@moscafj I've looked at them, but weirdly enough they're too soft. Spatz's somehow manages to be fluffy and open without being, like, pillowy-soft.
Is yeast an ingredient? Because there’s a process to make commercial bread that’s basically like carbonating a soda, so there’s no actual yeast involved
It looks like ‘aerated bread’ was invented around 1862… unless it was a trade secret in some other company? So the timing is close, but might not be it: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aerated_Bread_Company
Can we get a list of ingredients in the order they are on the packaging. It might well be that they are using non-yeast leavening in addition to yeast.
@Joe Yes, yeast is listed on the ingredients list on the bag. I've added the ingredients list to the question per bob1's request.
@bob1 Done! I also included a link to the photo I pulled the list from.
Maybe steamed then baked? Fairly common in Asian (China etc) breads, which are also very pale, light and airy
Wow…. Yeast is listed before both buttermilk and shortening. I would think that has to be fresh yeast, not dried yeast. And even then that seams like a crazy amount. I also like bob1’s steam suggestion. Or maybe a really warm proofing (as slower proofing is often to get more flavor)
Is it some type of soda bread? It uses buttermilk and baking soda instead of yeast.
@RYZEXY They do list yeast in the ingredients, and not baking soda, so I doubt it. Though what I can't get over is the fact that there's apparently more yeast by weight than there is buttermilk or shortening. Given the relative weights of each, that seems to imply either a LOT of yeast, or the tiniest bit of buttermilk and shortening.
@thatgirldm right, my bad. Didn't see that.
One way to reduce the taste of yeast is paradoxically to use more yeast.
With more yeast (and higher temperature, and more sugar) you can make the dough rise faster, which yields less of the yeasty flavour. (Normally the process is the reverse - in order to get more yeasty flavour, use less yeast and let it rise for longer (and at lower temperature)).
An other alternative is to use the Chorleywood process, but that's not really suitable for home use.
I also think you're a bit confused regarding the use of 'wheat' as an adjective. Most white bread is made with wheat flour (i.e. ground endosperm from triticum), but when some (American?) bakers say 'wheat', what they really mean is 'whole-wheat', which does not mean '100% wheat', but rather that the flour they're using is (at least partly) made from whole wheat grains.
You're right that I was confused about "wheat" as an adjective! Some googling later, I'm realizing they mean plain ol' white flour. D'oh!
Sorry for how long it took me to mark this as an answer - there are only so many test loaves of bread my household can eat at a time! I still haven't quite replicated the flavor I'm after, but following this advice as well as @joe's comments has gotten me pretty close. Thank you!
You can't get rid of the yeasty flavor in bread completely, however it's a subtle flavor and you can cover it up with other flavors. The ingredients of your DANGgood bread show it's an enriched bread as it has added oil, fat (from the buttermilk) and sugar. You could use the same approach and make an enriched bread yourself for the flavor aspects, enriched breads also have a very pillowy structure. I personally have a Japanese milk bread recipe that has eggs, milk, butter and sugar in it and it's become my absolute go-to recipe as it's absolutely reliable, and extremely delicious. I have adapted it to use a 50:50 mix of white and whole spelt flour, and it still gives extremely elastic results.
You could also look to other flours with a strong flavor, for instance rye, to cover the yeasty flavor, however ryes tend not to have the structure you are looking for.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.752038
| 2022-03-24T20:09:46 |
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|
57140
|
Premium Young Chicken packed in broth
Can I freeze a Tyson Premium Young Chicken packed in broth? I bought a twin pack of Tyson's Premium Young Chickens at Walmart. They have a broth packed in them that makes the packages resemble water balloons. Will the broth burst the sealed plastic liner if I freeze one? Thanks for your help. Jw
Usually plastic wrapping doesn't burst from freezing, since its somewhat stretchable (unlike, say, glass). Even if it does burst, it's going to tear a seam or some weak spot—there shouldn't be an explosion.
There is an easy safeguard to take though—just put a gallon freezer bag around it (squeeze out as much air as you can). Or sit it in a container to catch any drippings.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.752495
| 2015-05-03T00:00:03 |
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70978
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What are the principal components of coconut taste, and how do they differ between fresh and stale coconuts?
I was used to drinking coconut milk and finding that it is nice, a bit sweet, and a bit bland.
One day i had a normal supermarket coconut, that tasted like Malibu essence inside. Is that what a very fresh coconut tastes like?
I am a chemist, and I am want to know if coconut aromatics vary a lot in between fresh and old coconuts, and if so, why?
I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because it hurts the "questions should not be a rant in disguise" rule, see http://cooking.stackexchange.com/help/dont-ask.
Actually, i am a chemist, and i am interested in Esters, freshness, savors, aromatics, consumer foods, industrial foods, food transport, maritime transport, seed biology, seed longevity, and my question has a scientific perspective, as asked to people that know about coconuts more than chemists do. I have lived in India and Indonesia where there are a lot of coconuts and didn't recall drinking a cocounut with aromatic coconut aroma over there, so i am puzzled why i found one in the UK.
where do you reckon the question belongs to on stack then . Biology? How can a quesiton about freshness and taste conservation of an edible not belong to the cooking forum?
Hmm, I'd have to think about a possible rewording. The problem is that taste is not a straight function of chemistry, and we don't have specialists in neurogastronomy here - so even if we were to reword it to make it more about the reasons in your different perceptions, we couldn't even establish whether this taste is something somebody else would have experienced, much less what the causes for it were.
I have edited the question to ask more for "what are the chemical differences which might point to an explanation" and be less inviting of a "why won't Big Food sell me what I want to eat" interpretation. Is it OK for you?
Ok perhaps it is an organic chemistry and biology question... It isn't so much about perceived flavor, because everyone agrees that shop coconuts milk doesnt smell like malibu, i figure it's about the loss of the aromatic gamma-Nonalactone in coconuts. the vapor of coconut is extraordinary (massoia lactone
odor: Sweet, coconut meat, lactonic, creamy, milky and waxy
flavor: Creamy, coconut, milky, green and slightly fruity) and if a coconut has or not is very noticeable and objective to everyone.
Hey thanks for the change to the question, sounds fine with me.
By the way, i would suggest, that if you think that question could be unacceptable because it is perhaps a rant in disguise, perhaps you are having a bad day and that you are seeing a possible rant in a totally innocent figure of speech. The question was worded about as simply and innocently as it could be. flavors volatilize, i wasn't inviting blame for the an explanation of why and how fast coconuts lose coconut ethylene, with due respect that was a negative interpretation of simple wording.
@comprehensible There are a lot of rants in disguise on the network. The fact that yours wasn't may possibly be the exception rather than the rule. Mods see a lot of bad content that you don't see because it gets deleted. Maybe you shouldn't assume somebody is having a bad day because they didn't react positively to your post.
just passing along a few pointers There is a flavor industry, since you're a chemist you can probably read the food science literature—at least if anyone has (publicly) studied it. Also, MOFAD is currently doing a exhibit on flavor—maybe one of those folks could give a few pointers?
I don't have more than a basic knowledge of chemistry and the information I have I translated from a German book on spices and seasoning. All errors are therefore mine. The book is basically a description of a huge amount of spices, herbs and other seasonings, as well as a description of the chemistry involved which leads to the taste.
The difference in taste between coconut milk (if canned, as I assume) and fresh coconut water is easily explained. Canned coconut milk is basically a purée of coconut flesh mixed with water, which is why it has a different taste. Sadly, the book did not contain information on whether or how the flavour compounds (is that the correct word?) differ from coconut flesh to coconut water.
The book gives the following flavour compounds as responsible for the taste:
δ-Octalactone described as tasting creamy and of caramel
γ-Octalactone sweet and fatty
2-Nonanone fruity, sweet and earthy
Limonene lemon and turpentine
Responsible for the smell are the following (I have no idea what the letters and number in the parenthesis are supposed to mean, I'll simply include them):
10% Caprylic acid (C 8:0)
10% Decanoic acid (C 10:0)
50% Lauric acid (C 12:0)
15% Myristic acid (C 14:0)
10% Palmitic acid (C 16:0)
5% Oleic acid (C 18:1)
I hope this helps somehow.
Ah, older coconuts are also described as tasting slightly soapy.
The numbers refer to the length of the triglyceride chain backbone, in carbon atoms (deca = 10)
Ah, I thought it was something along those lines, but I wasn't sure.
I have a fond attachment to coconut and can't do without it on a daily basis. I always use fresh coconut. Fresh coconut always is sweet and tasty in that sense. Also freshly squeezed home made coconut is tastier than store bought ones. The reason may be coconut has so much milk stored in the flesh which is tastiest when consumed fresh . Shelf life of coconut is not that longer if broken once. As days goes by it begins to get ripe losing the liquid content and dried up. You can very well taste the difference. Also if unused for a long time it gets spoiled, and the taste can be easily be found inedible. Ripe coconuts if not rotten can be sun dried and used in dishes it calls for, or can be used to obtain coconut oil. I hope it will all make sense only if you start using fresh coconut on a regular basis. Thanks.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.752611
| 2016-06-27T11:43:01 |
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|
110971
|
What does ginger lose if puréed or ground and left over time?
I know with certain herbs and spices once you cut them open or grind them they can lose aroma, volatile oils and vitamins.
I’m wondering about ginger. People either use it fresh, use a prepared version which may already have been on the shelf, or a ground one which has been on the shelf for a while.
So what is the difference between freshly puréed and ground, and/or puréed or ground and then left for a while?
It'll lose its "spiciness"; you will still have the ginger taste and aroma, but you'll lose the kick that fresh ginger gives out.
Spelling fixed. I would point out that the taste and aroma will diminish as well, just not nearly as fast as that spicy kick.
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.753064
| 2020-10-01T17:23:43 |
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784
|
Translating cooking terms between US / UK / AU / CA / NZ
This post is an attempt to keep track of the terms that differ between dialects of English or exist in some dialects but not others: British (UK) / Australian (AU) / Canadian (CA) / American (US) / New Zealand (NZ), etc.
Please note that Canada may be difficult to classify, as some regions (especially near the southern border) use US terms, while others may use UK terms.
It's a community wiki, so feel free to edit and clarify or add additional items. The comments are getting long, so use answers for discussion of specific concepts if necessary. If you're not sure what a term means, ask it as a new question and tag it with language)
For similar terms in other languages or terms that do not translate cleanly, see What international cooking terms sound similar but have different meanings? .
Fruits & Vegetables:
Eggplant (US, CA, AU, NZ) is an aubergine (UK, NZ).
Zucchini (US, CA, AU) is a courgette (UK, NZ) when harvested young or a marrow (UK, AU) when allowed to mature further.
Summer Squash (US) are members of the squash family with a short storage life typically harvested before full maturity; typically available starting in the spring and summer; includes zucchini, yellow and crookneck squash.
Winter Squash (US) are members of the squash family that are allowed to reach full maturity before harvesting; typically available in the fall; includes pumpkin, acorn and butternut squash.
also note that squash may refer to a drink (see "cordial")
Arugula (US, CA) is rocket (UK, AU, NZ).
Rutabaga (US, CA) is swede (UK, AU, NZ), but also called turnip, Swedish turnip or neep in some parts of the UK, particularly Scotland. (Wikipedia). Not to be confused with a turnip (AKA white turnip), which is a similar, smaller vegetable.
Endive (US, NZ) is chicory (Belgium, UK, NZ perhaps others).
Capsicum (AU, NZ) / bell pepper (US, CA) is a pepper (UK). Note that for people with a biology background 'capsicum' also includes hot peppers (aka chilies or chili peppers)
Peppers (US, CA) (note the plural), is typically short for chili peppers unless qualified as sweet peppers or bell peppers, or specified as peppercorn.
Colored peppers (US, CA, UK), (eg, red peppers, green peppers), typically refers to bell peppers unless qualified (eg, 'hot red peppers', 'small red peppers')
Pepper (US, CA, NZ, UK) (note the singular) refers to black peppercorns unless otherwise qualified.
Red pepper (US, note the singular) refers to dried, red chilies (typically cayenne) that has been dried and ground or crushed.
Seaweed (US) has many names based on type of plant, including Kombu (Japan), Nori (Japan), Laver (Wales), and many others. See (edible seaweed)
Snow peas (US, CA, AU, NZ) are mange tout (UK) (word borrowed from French meaning 'eat everything'). Mange tout (UK) also includes sugar snap peas (US, UK), but these are not the same thing. Snap peas are fatter, similar to conventional green peas, while mange tout are flat. In both cases the peas and pod are eaten together.
Peanuts (US, CA, AU, NZ) may sometimes be sold in the UK as monkey nuts, especially if unshelled. And Peanut Oil may be known in the UK as groundnut oil.
Legumes (US, CA) are pulses (UK, CA, NZ). 'Legume' may refer to the plant and not the seeds (lentils, beans, etc).
Boiling potatoes (US) are waxy potatoes (UK, US). This refers to low-starch potatoes that don't fall apart when cooked. Sometimes called roasting potatoes (US, CA). New potatoes behave like waxy potatoes, even if they come from a variety used for baking.
Mealy potatoes (US) are floury potatoes (UK) or baking potatoes (UK, US, CA). This refers to high starch, low moisture potatoes that result in significant softening when cooked (useful for mashed potatoes or using for thickening; the opposite of waxy potatoes).
Runner Beans (UK, NZ) are large flat green beans or string beans (US, CA) (Farmhouse Cookery). UK also has green beans and stringless beans, but neither is the same as runner beans.
Broad Beans (UK, AU, NZ) are fava beans, butter beans or lima beans (US, CA) (Farmhouse Cookery)
Sultanas (UK, AU, NZ) are seedless golden raisins (Farmhouse Cookery)
Spring onions (UK, AU, CA, NZ), Scallions (US, CA), and green onions may not always be the same thing, but can typically be substituted for each other. (more details).
Corn (US) always refers to maize. Most Americans don’t even know what maize is. Corn in other countries may refer generically to grain.
Herbs, Spices & Seasonings:
Kosher(ing) salt (US, CA) is flaked salt (UK). Refers to the Jewish dietary practice of salting meat to remove blood. It has become a standard salt used in cured meat products as it is coarse and often without additives that may lead to off tastes when used in cures. Some sea salts may be appropriate substitutes (ref).
Cilantro (US, CA) is known as Coriander (UK, AU, CA, NZ), and it tends to refer to the leaf, unless qualified as coriander seed. May be qualified as fresh coriander or green coriander. Ground coriander is always the seed.
Coriander (US, CA) refers to the seed.
Celeriac (UK, AU, US) is celery root (US) (Farmhouse Cookery)
Stock cubes (AU, NZ, UK) are bouillon cubes (US, CA). May be Maggi cube or Oxo cube (UK; brand name issues) or simply stock cube (UK)
Mixed Spice (UK, NZ) aka pudding spice (UK) is roughly equivalent to Pumpkin Pie Spice (US, CA) (aka pie spice or pumpkin spice). Both are spice blends heavy in cinnamon and nutmeg, likely to have allspice and possibly other similar spices. Either one may have ginger and cloves as well. Mixed spice may contain coriander (seed) or caraway.
Pumpkin spice (US) is the spice for adding to pumpkin pies (usually a blend of cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, ginger and such) and doesn’t contain pumpkin or any other squash.
Chili powder (US) is a spice mixture for seasoning chili con carne. Chili powder contains mainly ground chili peppers (eg, cayenne), onion powder, garlic powder and cumin. Mixtures vary, and often include oregano, black pepper, paprika and/or salt.
Chili powder (CA, NZ) or chilli powder (UK) is pure ground chili peppers. In the US, it is usually qualified with a variety of chili and includes an "e" such as "New Mexico chile powder" or "Ancho chile powder". (See also "red pepper", above.)
(see also 'peppercorns' for a discussion of 'black pepper', under the discussion of 'pepper' in Fruits & Vegetables)
Baked Goods:
Cookies (US, CA) are biscuits (UK, AU, NZ).
Biscuits (US, CA) are similar to a scone (UK, AU, NZ), and usually neither sweet nor savory.
Scone (US, CA) tends to be sweeter than a scone (UK).
Graham Crackers (US, CA) are roughly analogous to Digestive biscuits in the UK (both may be used to make a crust or dessert base, for example).
Muffin (US, CA, AU, NZ) is a quick bread (typically using the 'muffin method') baked in forms used for cupcakes. It increasingly has this meaning in the UK too, with the prevalence of American-style coffee-shop chains. Muffin (UK) is english muffin (US, CA, AU, NZ), a yeast leavened flat-ish bread, cooked on a griddle with a ring form.
Sponge cake is a term for the lighter range of "typical" cake in both US and UK. However, since the range of cakes typically baked varies between the US and UK, in British usage one finds "sponges" that are heavier and denser than what an American would call a "sponge". See this answer for further discussion.
Pancake (US, CA) generally refers to puffy items made from a thick leavened batter but generally smaller than an American pancake. (AU may use 'pancake' for items larger than "silver dollar pancakes"). Pancake can go by a number of names in the US, including hotcakes, griddlecakes, flapjacks and hoecakes.
Pancake (UK, AU, NZ) is made from a thinner unleavened batter, with a result a little thicker than a french crêpe. Drop scone (or scotch pancake) (UK) or Pikelet (AU, NZ) is similar to a (US, CA) pancake
Flapjack (US) is the same thing as a (US) pancake. But flapjack (UK) is a baked square usually consisting of sugar/honey, butter, and oats, vaguely similar to a granola bar (ref)
Frosting (US, CA) is icing (UK, CA, AU, NZ). In the US, frosting typically has air whipped into it, while icing (US) doesn't and dries harder.
Turnover (US, CA) or hand pie (US, CA) is pasty/pastie (ˈpas-tē) (UK, NZ, CA). (Pasties (ˈpās-tēz) in the US are coverings to comply with nudity laws in strip clubs.) Turnover (UK) is a puff pastry shell, usually triangular, filled with fruit and whipped cream. In Australia, pasty is usually a meat and vegetable filled pastry, while a similar fruit-filled items is a turnover
Flan (US, CA) is créme caramel (AU, CA). (ref)
Flan (AU, UK) is a sweet pastry tart, usually containing custard and fruit. In the UK it can also refer to a savoury version, similar to a quiche.
Coffee Cake (US) is spiced cake often served for breakfast or occasionally as a snack with coffee. They often have a streusel like topping.
Coffee Cake (UK, NZ) is a cake that is flavored with coffee.
Flour:
plain flour (UK, AU, NZ) is wheat flour with an 8-10% protein content. You can typically use all-purpose flour (US, CA) (aka 'AP flour' or just 'AP' on cooking shows) unless otherwise qualified (eg, 'plain, strong flour') in which case it just means 'not self-rising'. Note that AP flour in the US South (eg, White Lily brand) tends to be closer to UK plain flour than northern and national brands of AP flour (eg, King Arthur, Gold Medal). See https://cooking.stackexchange.com/a/126064/67
soft flour (UK) is lower gluten than AP flour, such as pastry flour (US, CA) or cake flour (US, CA)
strong flour (UK) aka. hard flour (UK, CA) is higher gluten flour, such as bread flour (US, CA)
self-rising flour (US, CA) is available in the US, but less common. It is referred to as self-raising flour in the UK, AU and NZ. Although it has baking powder in it, it does not have fat in it such as Bisquick or other 'baking mixes'.
UK Self-raising flour does not contain salt. Apparently US self-rising flour does.
wholemeal flour (UK, NZ) is whole wheat flour (US, CA)
Meats:
Ground beef (US, CA) is minced beef (AU, UK) or simply mince (UK, AU, NZ).
Canadian bacon (US), peameal bacon (CA) is also back bacon (from the loin). Canadian grocery stores may have multiple brands that use both names.
Bacon (CA, US) is streaky bacon (UK) (from the belly). In the UK, bacon is most likely back bacon.
Green Bacon (UK) is "unsmoked bacon cured in brine" (Farmhouse Cookery)
Gammon (UK) is "ham-like bacon from the pig's hindquarters" (Farmhouse Cookery). Essentially it is an uncooked joint of ham, designed to be cooked at home.
Pork rinds (US, CA) are scratchings (UK, when dry) and crackling (AU, NZ & UK when fresh from a roast).
Brawn (UK) is head cheese (US, CA) (Farmhouse Cookery)
Names of cuts of meat in the US may differ from other countries. See Wikipedia for images of US and British names of regions
Prawns (AU, UK) and shrimp (US) are technically different animals, but are frequently labeled by the more common one in that country, and are often substituted for each other. In Canada and the UK, shrimp may be used to refer to smaller sizes and prawn for larger.
Dairy: (ref, ref)
Light Cream (CA) has 5% butterfat. Light Cream (US) is 18 to 30% butterfat. (Lite Cream (AU) is roughly 18% butterfat)
Table Cream (CA) is 15% or 18% butterfat.
Single cream (UK) is at least 18% butterfat. Equivalent to Lite Cream (AU), Thickened Cream - Reduced Fat (AU), Table Cream (CA), Coffee Cream (CA). Extra Thick Single Cream (UK) contains stabilizers.
Cream (US) with 5% butterfat is not commonly found in the UK
Half-and-half (US) is a mix of half cream, half milk (about 12.5% butterfat in the US, but 10% butterfat in CA). May be called blend cream (CA).
Cooking Cream (CA (Quebec)) is either 15% or 35% butterfat, thickened with stabilizers and emulsifiers
Country-Style Cream (CA (Quebec)) is either 15% or 35% butterfat, with stabilizers and emulsifiers
Whipping Cream (CA) is 33 to 36% butterfat, and may have stabilizers. Equivalent to Thickened Cream (AU), Pouring Cream (AU) or Single Cream (AU). Whipping Cream (US) may be from 30 to 36% milkfat. Whipping Cream (UK) contains at least 35% butterfat.
Heavy cream (US) aka heavy whipping cream (US) = cream with more than 36% fat, and often has stabilizers
Regular Cream (AU, NZ) or Pure Cream (AU) are roughly 40% butterfat without thickening agents.
Double Cream (UK) is at least 48% milkfat. Extra Thick Double Cream (UK) contains stabilizers.
Rich Cream (AU), Thick Cream (AU), or Double Cream (AU) is a spoonable cream with 48% butterfat or more.
Clotted Cream (UK, CA) or Devon Cream (UK), has been heated to evaporate liquid, resulting in a spoonable cream with about 55% milkfat.
Buttermilk (US, CA, modern usage, aka 'cultured buttermilk') is a fermented product, basically a runny yogurt, while historically buttermilk is the liquid left over after churning butter. Historic buttermilk made with fresh milk is closer to today's skim milk, but if made with sour milk is closer to cultured buttermilk.
Sour cream (US, CA, NZ) = soured cream (UK)
Sugar:
powdered sugar or confectioners sugar (US, CA) is icing sugar (UK, CA, NZ) or icing sugar mixture (AU) or 10X (US Chef slang); contains cornstarch (~3%) as an anti-clumping agent.
icing sugar (AU), aka pure icing sugar does not have starch in it.
superfine sugar (US, CA) is caster sugar (UK, NZ, AU); may also be called berry sugar (CA), fruit sugar (CA), bar sugar, castor sugar, instant dissolving sugar, ultrafine sugar, fondant sugar, or extra fine sugar.
sanding sugar (US) is pearl sugar (CA). (size between coarse sugar & granulated sugar)
unless otherwise qualified, sugar (US, CA, NZ, UK) is granulated sugar
Other Food / Ingredients:
entree (US, CA) is the main course. Entree (AU, NZ) is a starter course, or appetizer (US, CA) course. (ref). The term is rarely used in the UK, but is more likely to be understood to be a starter.
dessert (US, CA, AU) is pudding, sweets, dessert or afters (UK, depending on region and social class). Pudding is usually a cooked item, while dessert may be fresh fruit or other non-cooked item.
pudding (US, CA) is roughly equiv. to custard (UK, CA)
pudding (UK) is a much broader range of items, including savoury foods like black pudding (a kind of blood sausage) and Yorkshire pudding (oven baked batter puffs served alongside savoury foods, usually roast dinners), due to its historical roots which applied to various foods boiled in animal innards or muslin cloth, but unless qualified usually refers to a sweet dessert item.
jello (US, CA; brand name issues) is jelly (UK, AU, NZ)
jelly (US) is seedless jam (UK, NZ) (see answer below for details)
fries (US, CA, abbr. for french fries) are chips (UK, NZ, CA for 'fish and chips'); both terms work in AU and NZ, as does hot chips.
chips (UK) are steak fries (US, CA), rather than the typical American shoestring fries
chips (US, CA, NZ) are crisps (UK). AU and NZ have mixed usage.
cornstarch (US, CA) is cornflour (UK, AU, NZ)
corn flour (US; aka fine corn meal) is maize flour (AU),
a finer ground version of cornmeal (US, UK) or polenta (US, UK, NZ). Cornflour (UK) is the extracted starch derived from the raw corn kernal, not the dry ground flesh of the whole kernal. Also called masa harina (US) if made from nixtamalized corn.
cornflour (AU, NZ) is a powdered starch, but not necessarily made from corn, as there is also 'wheaten cornflour'. (ref)
cider (US) is unfiltered (cloudy) juice, commonly from apples, while cider (UK, NZ) is an alcoholic beverage made from apple juice (aka. hard cider (US) or scrumpy (UK) for stronger dry ciders). cider (AU) refers to both the alcoholic beverage and any non-alcoholic carbonated apple juice. cider in Canada refers to hot spiced apple beverages and both non-alcoholic and alcoholic apple and pear beverages, carbonated or fermented.
cordial [US] is a flavored alcohol, while cordial [UK, CA, AU, NZ] is a liquid drink flavoring that is intended to be diluted with water. (ref). In the UK some types of cordial are often referred to as squash.
liquid smoke (US, CA, NZ) is condensed smoke, used as a flavoring.
black beer (UK) is a malt liquor/fortified wine containing malt.
black beer (US, Germany), also called black lager or schwarzbier is a type of lager brewed with extremely dark malt.
tomato sauce (UK, AU, NZ) is ketchup (UK, US, CA). Also catsup and other spelling variants.
tomato sauce (UK, US, CA) is a tomato based sauce typically for pasta or pizza. It may refer to canned tomato sauce which is thinned tomato paste possibly with herbs or spices, or a more complex Italian style cooked sauce of tomatoes, onions, garlic, and other spices and ingredients typically served over pasta (sometimes called marinara or jarred tomato sauce)
tomato paste (US, CA, AU, NZ) is tomato purée (UK), a thick, concentrated tomato product.
tomato purée (US, CA, AU) is unreduced tomatoes (possibly stewed) with the skin and seeds removed. Also called crushed tomatoes (although crushed tomatoes may still have seeds).
tomato passata (UK, CA) (sometimes just 'passata') is strained tomato purée (US).
golden syrup (UK, NZ) is dark cane sugar syrup (US, CA); corn syrup is an acceptable substitute (Farmhouse Cookery)
rapeseed oil (UK) is Canola oil (US, CA, AU, NZ). (abbreviation for "Canada oil, low acid")
vegetable oil (US, CA, AU, NZ, UK) is any flavorless oil with a decent smoke point. It may be soy, corn, rapeseed, or a blend, but you can use peanut (groundnut (UK)), canola (rapeseed (UK)), or extra light (not extra virgin) olive oil.
EVOO (US cooking show) is “extra virgin olive oil”
oats (US) unless qualified are 'old fashioned' or 'rolled oats', not groats (which are sold as 'pinhead oats'), 'Steel cut oats' (cut up groats but not flattened, aka. 'Irish oatmeal'), nor 'instant oats' (flattened & parcooked). Oatmeal (UK) only refers to coarsely ground oats, whereas oatmeal (US) often refers to any cooked oat breakfast dish, aka porridge (UK). Porridge (UK) is typically made with rolled oats.
granola (US, CA) is a cooked sweetened oat dish that may include nuts or dried fruit, and may be pressed into bars. It looks similar to muesli (UK) which is raw oats, nuts and fruit.
trail mix (US, CA) or Scroggin (NZ, AU) is a mixture of nuts and dried fruit. It may include granola, seeds (eg. sunflower) or chocolate (typically in the form of M&Ms)
Smarties (UK, CA, AU, NZ) are similar to the candy M&Ms
Smarties (US) or Rockets (CA) are compressed sugar pellets (similar to PEZ tablets, but round with concave sides, packaged in rolls with twisted ends)
Candy (US, CA) is sweets (UK) or lollies (NZ, AU). Lollies (UK) only refers to sweets on sticks, or to ice lollies, which are frozen desserts on a stick, i.e. popsicles (US)
Fried egg in the UK and NZ is what Americans/Canadians call sunny-side up unless otherwise qualified. The US/CA terms over-easy, over-medium, over-well and over-hard are typically unknown in the UK. For a definition of the 'over' terms, see Can someone please give an explanation of different egg preparations? . (more details )
Casserole (UK, NZ) is a stew, a mixture of bite-sized chunks of (typically) meat and vegetables that is cooked submerged in liquid at low heat for a long period of time.
Casserole (US, CA) is a bake (UK, US) or hotdish (US), and refers to any mixture of food baked in a casserole dish (sometimes shortened to simply casserole), an oven-safe, relatively deep, typically ceramic vessel. A casserole (US) is typically not as wet as a stew. It includes dishes that are composed of pre-cooked ingredients and then mixed or layered in a suitable vessel and baked to finish. (ref)
Cooking methods:
broiling (US, CA) is grilling (AU, UK, NZ) which is cooking with heat from above as in some ovens or restaurant salamanders.
grilling (US, CA) is barbecuing (AU, NZ, UK, CA) which is cooking with heat from below, typically on a metal rack over a vessel of burning wood or charcoal, or a gas burner.
barbecuing (US) is slow cooking using wood or charcoal to impart smoke to the food. In parts of the USA (e.g Pacific North West) barbecue is used in the sense of grilling above. This sense is also sometimes used in AU and NZ.
barbeque (US, CA, NZ) (sometimes abbreviated BBQ) may refer to the either food cooked through barbequeing, or the device on which it is cooked.
Tools / Equipment / Non-food items :
parchment paper (US, CA) is greaseproof paper (Ireland/ UK) and baking paper (AU, NZ)
stove (US, CA, AU, NZ) is also range (US, CA, NZ) and hob (UK, rarely NZ). Hob can refer to both the stove as a whole, or an individual burner (aka. heating element).
crock pot (US, CA; brand name issues) is a slow cooker (US, CA, UK, AU, NZ). Also slo-cooker (UK; brand name issues)
food processor (US, CA, AU, UK) is sometimes a magimix (UK; brand name issues)
canned items (US, CA) are tinned (UK, AU, NZ). Items 'canned' in glass jars would be described as either preserved or pickled (if in vinegar) in the UK and NZ.
recipe (US, CA, NZ, AU) is sometimes called a receipt in other areas and in older usage (until early 20th century; more info).
receipt (US, CA, UK, NZ, modern usage) is "a written acknowledgment of having received a specified amount of money, goods, etc."
aluminum foil (US), aluminium foil (UK, AU, NZ) is often referred to as tinfoil (US, UK, NZ), which had previously been in use for similar purposes. It is usually shortened to foil or al-foil in AU.
plastic wrap (US, CA), cling film (UK), cling wrap (AU) is often referred to as Saran™ wrap (US brand name) or Glad™ wrap (NZ, AU brand name) (although no one bothers to say the '™')
liquidiser (UK) is a blender (US, CA) (Farmhouse Cookery). blender in AU refers to both a food processor and a liquidiser.
skillet (US, CA) is a frying pan (US, CA, UK, NZ). (a type of low-sided round cooking vessel with handle (pan (US)), with angled sides.)
paper towels (US, CA) are kitchen towels or kitchen roll in other countries.
dish towels (US), aka kitchen towels (US) or tea towels (UK, AU, NZ), are reusable cloth towels.
Kitchen bench (AU, NZ) is the kitchen counter (US, CA), worktop (UK).
a slice (UK) is a slotted metal spatula (US, CA). Specifically a ‘fish slice’ or ‘egg slice’
spatula (US, CA) is any tool with a flat, typically wide working surface. It may refer to a scraper (rubber spatula; silicone spatula), a tool for spreading (offset spatula), or a tool for flipping/turning food (typically plastic or metal), or a tool for stirring (wooden spatula)
Units of measurement & sizing :
teaspoon (US, UK, CA , NZ) is 5 mL (note: abbreviated 't' or 'tsp')
dessert spoon (UK) is 10 mL (although may have historically been closer to 15mL)
tablespoon (US, CA, NZ) is roughly 15 mL (note: abbreviated 'T', 'TB', or 'tbsp') but a tablespoon (UK) is 17.7mL and tablespoon (AU) is 20 mL. Historical British cookbooks may use an ~25mL tablespoon. (more details).
A stick of butter (US, CA) is 1/4 lb (113 g); the physical stick is marked into eight "tablespoon" divisions [slightly larger than an actual tablespoon, roughly 14g each]. A block of butter (UK, NZ) is typically 250g, and packaging is often marked in 50g portions.
A knob of butter (UK) is somewhere around 2 TB (US), but is an inexact measure.
A pat of butter (US) is between 1 and 2 tsp (5 to 10 mL), most commonly 48 per lb, or ~1.5 tsp. (~9.5 grams, 7.5mL)
A cup (US) for cooking is a fixed measure of ~236mL (8 fluid ounces, 16 TB, 1/2 a US pint); A British Imperial cup is 1/2 of an Imperial pint (~284mL) Other countries may use a 225mL 'cup' or 250mL 'metric cup' (AU, NZ and some regions of CA)
A cup of coffee or tea (when measuring electric kettles) may be based on 5 or 6 oz 'cups'. Always look for the volume in mL or L when buying such items.
A cup of uncooked rice (for rice cooker instructions) is 175mL, roughly 3/4 of a US cup.
A pint (UK, AU, CA) is 20 Imperial fluid ounces (568.261 mL), while a pint (US) is 16 fluid ounces (473.176 mL).
A gas mark (UK) refers to the dials on some British gas ovens (Farmhouse Cookery). The marks from 1 to 9 correspond roughly to 275 - 475 °F (at 25 °F intervals) or 140 - 250 °C (at 10 °C intervals) (more detail below)
A tin (UK) of tomatoes is the sized tin can (in US, just called a "can") that it's typically sold in. For many vegetables, this is a 400mL / ~14oz container, but is not a constant (for example, anchovies or tomato paste). (ref; see below)
Unless otherwise qualified, assume an egg is about 60 grams. (a 'large egg' (US,CA), but a 'medium egg' in Europe). (ref)
It's a teaspoon in Canada.
@chris : do people measure stuff in desert spoons in Canada? (of course, it might even be a regional thing ... like it's just a western/eastern thing ... after some quick research, it looks like Graham Kerr was a Scot, who grew up in England, spent time in New Zealand, but had a cooking show in Canada (Ottawa). So he might've picked up the term from a number of places. I might have to to a table of concept vs. celebrity chef, have a special 'how to translate Jamie Oliver' section.
@joe I've never heard the term desert spoon used as a measurement, and I've been cooking and baking for 35 years. (Started off making cookies with my mom when I was 5).
Granted, I'm from Toronto, which has melded into the greater North American generic culture. It might be a regional thing. from the Maritimes.
What's called jelly in the US is jam in the UK. Also should it be castor or caster sugar?
@heycam -- jelly in the US is specifically made from fruit juice, sugar, and some sort of thickener, where for us, 'jam' is made from mashed fruit, so has a much different consistency. Do you consider both to be 'jam', or is there a term that differentiates the juice-only variant? ... as for the castor/caster issue, they both seemed to be acceptable spellings; I wasn't sure if it was a regional thing like ketchup/catsup/etc.
I edited the list to make it all US on the left side, by the way. OED says that castor is slightly preferred to caster sugar, so I suggest leaving it as castor.
@Joe Hmm, I guess I would call them both of those jam -- they seem to be approximately the same condiment to me. :) Maybe the mashed fruit one could also be called a conserve?
In the UK, a teaspoon is 5ml, a dessert spoon is 10ml, and a table spoon is 15ml.
In the US, we also differentiate between "jam" and "preserves". However, the definition is kind of fuzzy... :)
@GalacticCowboy : it's the FDA's fault ... I put a more detailed explanation in an answer below.
Since this came up in another question, is there a UK equivalent for what we in the US call "biscuits"? The Cookies -> Biscuits correlation is listed above, but what about Biscuits -> ??
@GalacticCowboy : the closest I can come up with is 'Biscuit (US) is similar to a scone (UK)' as UK scones aren't like US ones.
I don't think the UK is blessed with the amazing hunk of food that is the Southern US biscuit.
@hobodave - true, the Southern biscuit definitely stands alone. :)
@ Joe. Since this is community Wiki, mind if I clean up the intro to get to the details a bit more succinctly?
@Ocaasi: @Joe won't be alerted if you put a space between the @ and his name.
@Joe Please see my question above... Thanks for the tip hobodave.
@Ocaasi : add to in however you think you can, even if it's just clearer formatting.
@Joe Well, I was going to delete some of your personal introduction, so that's why I asked. I'll do it and you can just undo the edit if you think it's better the other way.
@Ocaasi : we need enough to explain what the motivation is for the list. If it's a problem with the posts getting too long, the other option would be to explain what's going on in the question, and then use answers to break out the various sections (which is only a problem if we have to move things around; or we just use one large main answer, and other answers for longer detailed explanations)
@Joe It was just my preference to keep the intro text short, so people would quickly see this was a functional list and somehow different from a typical personal question. I'll add back some; change whatever you think was better before.
Correction: Bacon in Canada is cured/smoked pork belly. We refer to back bacon as such. But the default bacon is the same as in the US.
Source of info to harvest from : http://greatbritishkitchen.co.uk/web-site-pages/index-and-other-pages-for-menu-links/guides-to-british-food-and-cooking/
"rutabaga (US) is swede (UK)" - depends where you are. The terms 'swede' and 'turnip' swap from county to county. Where I'm from a swede is a hefty yellow ball-sized lump, a turnip a white and green golf ball-sized thing. Travel further south or north and the terms swap over... PS. sugar: it's written "caster" sugar on every packet in every supermarket in the UK. Castor oil is something very different.
@Gary: Feel free to edit the list - it's wiki and you have the reputation. The swede/rutabaga thing came as the direct result from a question being asked here about swedes (which half our members, being from North America, didn't understand).
@Aaronut Thanks for pointing that out. I didn't really know what a "community wiki" was. However my answer isn't a very neat one! I'll try and think of a way to ram that in.
Americans tend to call it 'aluminum foil' whereas in the UK I've always heard it referred to as 'tinfoil'; might be worth noting.
Rutabagas are also sometimes called "Neeps".
And in terms of zucchini, the small ones are called "Courgettes", but the large, pale ones are called "Marrows" instead.
@heathenJesus : in what region? a quick search suggest it's Scottish, but is it used in other areas, too?
@Joe - used most commonly by Scots, but it is a much older term, and you can occasionally hear it elsewhere in the British Isles, particularly amongst the older generations. Admittedly, a much rarer term, I felt like mentioning it for completeness' sake.
a list of canadian classifications of sugar : http://www.sugar.ca/english/consumers/typessugar.cfm
Granulated sugar (US) is granulated sugar (UK). I have never heard the term 'table sugar', it certainly isn't commonly used. Edited to reflect.
On 'peanut' vs 'groundnut' - I have only ever seen them referred to as peanuts in the UK, with the single exception of 'groundnut oil' (mostly in Asian grocers). Also I believe we would use 'passata' in the UK for what is described as US 'tomato puree' in the list.
Question - I've seen a lot of recipes lately for 'hand pies' from American cooks. The photos appear to be similar to what I would call a 'pastie' as a Brit. Are these equivalent, or is there a subtle difference?
@jam : yes, they're equivalent, although in some regions 'turnover' is more common. For Americans, 'pasties' are things that strippers use to cover their nipples, so wouldn't be used to talk about food unless qualified (eg, 'cornish pastie')
For Americans, 'pasties' are things that strippers use to cover their nipples... ha! Did not know that! Thanks... o.o
Most of the ones where the US and Canada differ are wrong. We often use "frosting", our 1-cup milk cartons are 237 mL and not 250, etc.
@MatthewRead : hmm ... and it's actually more complex as 'cup' of flour may be a different measurement than a 'cup' of tea or coffee. I'll see if I can straighten that one out.
Parchment paper is called parchment paper in Ireland/UK. It's a different product from greaseproof paper. Parchment paper is non-stick while greaseproof paper is paper that's impermeable to grease/fat(meaning that it can be greased without falling apart). Parchment paper is a relatively new arrival(last 15 years?) and the difference hasn't really sunk in with everyone, so they're frequently confused.
RE: Scones/biscuits. In the UK there are both "Sweet scones" and "Savoury Scones" (although very often they'll just be scones as it'll be obvious which category any given scone falls into).
Sweet scones seem to be the same as, or very similar to American "Biscuits". They contain plenty of sugar and often something like raisins compare this US Biscuit recipe(http://goo.gl/aBCHd) to this UK sweet scone(http://goo.gl/2MuCA).
We also have savoury scones which aren't sweetened and can contain all manner of things like spring-onions, cheese, mustard, peppers, onion...
Is "Capsicum" actually used commonly in the US? I've never heard this.
@Catija : commonly, no. And the problem is that 'capsicum' in botanical terms actually refers to both mold & hot pepper plants. I'll go make a note.
@Joe Hey, I suspect that it'd be helpful to consolidate some of the answers and comments here back into the question (and that some of that's already done). You know the lists better than I do, so feel free to just flag things you want gone and we can take care of it.
@ElendilTheTall : if you have a correction, then correct it ... just removing stuff that you don't agree with will be reverted unless you can provide something better.
@joe removing it is correcting it. It's not a matter of opinion: 'biscuit' does not mean 'Digestive biscuit' in the UK. A Digestive is a biscuit, but not all biscuits are Digestives. I don't 'disagree', it is simply wrong.
@joe I have added a separate entry on Graham crackers and Digestives :)
@Joe I'd be very interested in putting a wiki-answer lock on this (to protect against further new answers) but unfortunately it has multiple answers and a lot of the answers are in the question instead of an answer. Do you have any thoughts about how best to get this all consolidated?
@Jefromi : the answers re: jam/jelly/preserves and the british gas marks are more footnotes to the main question. There's only one other non-deleted question, which has some content that we likely need to make sure made it to the 'false friends' wiki.
What I see labeled as buttermilk in the US is usually a very thin, sour milk, as in the milk left over from making butter, where all the cream has been removed by the butter making process. I wouldn't say it's anything like "runny yogurt". Whether the sourness comes from fermentation or some process that removes or captures the milk sugars, I don't know. I do know that buttermilk is often replaced by regular or skim (nonfat) milk with a small amount of lemon juice or vinegar in it. Generally, biscuits (US) made with buttermilk are seen as superior to other kinds.
Ah, Wikipedia has cleared things up. If you read a recipe written by an American that calls for buttermilk, that means what Wikipedia lists as "traditional buttermilk". As an American whose whole family bakes and cooks pretty much daily, I think it's worth mention I've never heard the term "traditional buttermilk" before and never knew there were other uses for the word buttermilk before today. I suspect the Wikipedia article in question was not written by an American.
@Todd Wilcox thanks and sorry, it was a mistake when writing the comment. It should have read "Savoury Scones", not sweet.
Suggested correction: corn flour (US; aka masa harina/fine corn meal) is cornmeal or polenta (UK). Cornflour (UK) is the starch derived from the raw corn kernal, not the dry ground flesh of the raw kernal.
In the UK we have both broad beans and butter beans - the former are green and latter beige https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vicia_faba and http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/butter_bean and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phaseolus_lunatus ie fava and lima beans
@Mark : so if I'm reading this right (also http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/broad_beans ), 'butter beans' are typically lima beans, and 'broad beans' are fava?
@Joe I'm not sure about the muesli/granola one... maybe a definition would be helpful? I (as an American) think of muesli and granola as two different things... granola is usually toasted and often has something sweet making it into little clusters whereas muesli is unsweetened, raw. I don't know if the UK definitions are similar or not.
@Catija : it's actually from a deleted answer that someone left years ago : http://cooking.stackexchange.com/a/4556/67 . I had originally thought they were too trivial (eg, 'trail mix'), but I realized that if someone has no idea what it is, it'd be useful. I found a mention of granola being called muesli in AU, but the citation is useless. I assume it would be more accurate to say it's 'similar to muesli, but cooked' ... but I think muesli typically has fruit & nuts, while granola doesn't have to.
@Joe Yeah, I saw the comment on the edit but I can't see deleted posts quite yet. Mostly I wanted to point out that it may be inaccurate and something we don't quite want to have in the FAQ. I agree that the muesli I've seen seems to always have at least nuts if not also some sort of dried fruit while granola can be just toasted oats with honey or something similar.
@Catija : if you don't agree with the new definitions, feel free to edit it. I also cleaned up the cornflour stuff.
I've never heard of "waxy potatoes" in the UK. Any Brits got any ideas what we call these? I either buy "baking potatoes", "new potatoes" or "{named-variety} potatoes". I use baking potatoes for roasting, so it would appear I might be doing something wrong...
@AndyT : 'new potatoes' are equivalent, but it tends to refer to only the small ones. But they hold up when roasted or stewed better than starchy potatoes. Maybe I should stop listing things as 'UK' just because Jamie Oliver or one of the Two Fat Ladies as they might be regional / colloquialisms.
Pasties (the food, pronounced with a short-A) are well known in some mid-western U.S. states (e.g., Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota). They're particularly associated with Michigan's Upper Peninsula, where they're something of a point of cultural pride and a tourist attraction.
UK here - marrows are not "fully grown" courgettes / zuchini - they're a separate (albeit related) species. In most parts of the UK a swede and a turnip are also distinct (swedes being yellow). Bacon comes in three cuts - "streaky", which is what's common in the US, from the belly, or "back", cut from the loin, or "middle", which is the belly and loin pieces still attached. Gammon is cured, like bacon, but comes from the leg.
@KerryNitz : you marked 'Chips' as being both "French Fries" and "Crisps" in NZ. Are there better terms used for them that aren't ambiguous?
@Joe re: 'Chips': Probably not we do the same in AU
It looks like the stuff from this question never got added: https://cooking.stackexchange.com/questions/8742/is-there-a-difference-between-stew-and-casserole
@nick012000 : okay, I gave it a try. Hopefully someone from the UK will weigh in, as I'm not 100% certain that 'stew' is equivalent between the US and UK.
Wondering if molasses has AU and UK equivalents?
@NSGod : treacle for the UK. No idea about AU
I don't think the US definitions for "tomato sauce" and "marinara" are correct, and actually may be reversed. "Tomato sauce" (as I have always seen it used in recipes) refers to a tomato concentrate similar to a less viscous tomato paste and generally is unseasoned except for maybe salt. "Marinara sauce" is more used for pasta and pizza, it is seasoned, usually with garlic and basil, maybe some olive oil, sometimes oregano, and salt. As it is generally used here, "Tomato sauce" is more of a base ingredient for another sauce.
@Andrew: I don’t know if it’s a regional thing. If you said ‘canned tomato sauce’, then yeah, I’d assume watered down tomato paste, but if you said ‘tomato sauce’ without qualifying it, I’d assume jarred which tends to be made from tomatoes directly unless it’s a cheap brand. I’ll need to think about how to qualify it so it doesn’t take paragraphs to clearly explain the issue
@joe Yea I didn't exactly mean it was a watered down tomato paste, just that it is made of tomatoes but more aqueous than a paste (trying to refer to the consistency), and that tomato sauce isn't usually seasoned. Maybe it's about how it's being used? "Tomato sauce" listed as an ingredient is unseasoned and just includes tomatoes and maybe some salt, but "tomato sauce" listed as the actual sauce for a dish is seasoned / more similar to marinara?
@Andrew around me ‘tomato sauce’ is so generic that it can be an ingredient (such as in chili), or a finished dish (to serve with pasta). It’s more confusing when you have something like a lasagne where it’s something that could be served directly, but is used as an ingredient. Marinara usually is to be served, but for Italian-Americans, it’s a quick cooked dish, not the style typically sold in jars in the US.
Would it be appropriate to add the term ‘noodles’? (It appears to include pasta and similar in the US, but not in the UK; see this question on the English Stack.)
@gidds: yes, but I’m not sure exactly where the delineation is. I know Chinese only considers wheat based items to be noodles (so they’re ‘rice sticks’ not ‘rice noodles’ when translated. Germen ‘nudeln’ includes spaetzle, which Americans would consider dumplings. So is it how they’re made? (Technique, ingrredients?) or how they’re cooked? (In water and drained vs in a broth?). We might have to ask this as a separate question
"Chili powder" (CA) IMX is usually the same as (US), but you could be surprised. "Hot chili powder" is definitely pure ground chili peppers, usually cayenne. Also, I've never heard "dark cane sugar syrup", and "golden syrup" is a perfectly understandable term here - it's just hard to find compared to corn syrup.
"Cooking cream" (CA) definitely exists outside Quebec, but I've only seen it refer to a 35% version.
@KarlKnechtel part of this is to find reasonable substitutions, not just exact matches. Golden Syrup is one of those problem ingredients where it also contributes flavor, so it probably needs to be corn syrup plus something else, but I’m not exactly sure what. And you’re right, “Dark Cane Sugar Syrup” is probably harder to find than imported Golden Syrup here in the US.
US : jam/jelly/preserves/etc
In the US, there are specific definitions from the Food & Drug Administration on what can be labeled as jam, jelly, etc.
From CookingLight.com, but preserved here in case of link rot:
Jelly is a clear, bright product. It is generally made by cooking fruit juice and sugar with pectin as a jelling agent and lemon juice as an acid to maintain a consistent texture. Jelly is firm and will hold its shape (it 'shakes'). Generally, jelly contains no pieces of fruit, although specialty jellies, like pepper jelly, may include pieces of jalapeño or other pepper.
Jam is made from crushed or chopped fruit cooked with sugar, and often pectin and lemon juice. Jam can be a purée of fruit or have a soft pulp, but it does not contain chunks of fruit.
Preserves are fruit cooked with sugar to the point where large chunks of fruit or whole fruit, such as berries, are suspended in a syrup base. The texture of preserves is not smooth like jelly or jam.
Marmalade is a soft jelly, often citrus-based, that includes both the flesh and peel of the fruit suspended throughout the jelly base. The bitterness of the peel offsets the sweetness of the jelly.
Conserve is a mixture of more than one fruit, often with added nuts and raisins, that is cooked until it becomes thick. It is used as a spread for breads, pastries and meats, and in the latter use is closest to chutney.
Chutney is a spiced condiment of Indian origin (chatni is the Hindi word for strongly spiced) made of fruit or vegetables. It is typically served as an accompaniment to food, not as a spread. The spice level can range from mild to hot, and the consistency from a fine relish to a preserve or conserve. Fruit chutney consists of chopped fruit, vinegar, spices and sugar cooked into a chunky sweet-tart-spicy mix: according to one explanation, it 'blurs the Western distinction between preserves and pickles.'
Fruit Butter, such as apple butter or prune butter, is fruit purée or pulp combined with sugar, lemon juice and spices, slowly cooked down to a smooth consistency. The 'butter' refers to its spreadability: there is no actual butter in the product.
Fruit Curd is a creamy spread made with sugar, eggs and butter, generally flavored with citrus juice and zest.
Fruit Spread is generally a reduced-calorie product made with fruit juice concentrate and low-calorie sweeteners replacing all or part of the sugar.
+1 for the detailed explanation. In Italy, we use just two terms: marmellata, and confettura.
Salsa qualifies as Chutney. Pickles in India are dried veggies or raw fruits soaked(?) or brined in oil with dry herbs and spices. In some cases Indian pickles may be even brined only with vinegar. In US pickles are mostly brined in vinegar and may or may not contain spices. Correct me if I am wrong.
So, when the Americans talk about a "peanut butter and jelly sandwich", what is the 'jelly' they refer to? Does it match the definition above (Jelly is firm and will hold its shape (it 'shakes') ), or should it really be called a "peanut butter and jam sandwich"?
@Jez: the traditional PB&J is made with purple grape jelly, which does indeed hold its shape on, say, a spoon. However, like most jellies, it breaks down easily when spread onto the bread.
Italian law (namely the Decreto Legislativo 50/2004) is even stricter about the use of those words in labels. Specifically, it defines the following products as a gelified mixture of water, sugar and:
Jam (confettura): at least 35% of pulp or purée of one or more of any kind of fruit.
Marmalade (marmellata): at least 20% of one of more of pulp, purée, water extract, peel from citruses only.
Jelly (gelatina): at least 35% of juice or water extract of one or more of any kind of fruit.
Jelly marmalade (marmellata gelatina): a marmalade deprived of any insoluble element.
@kiamlaluno: Italy also has mostarda which is somewhat similar to chutney, both in recipe (sweet and spicy fruit preserve) and use (as a condiment to savoury dishes)
With the Brexit the EU countries will hopefully get the term marmelade back as well. See here.
@joelw Peameal bacon appears to also refer to a specific, different thing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peameal_bacon (there's a note there about terminology). Are you saying that in practice, Canadians tend to use "peameal bacon" to refer to both (original) peameal bacon and American "Canadian bacon"?
Oven Temperature Conversion Table
Gas mark
Fahrenheit
Celsius
Descriptor
1/4
225
110
slow
1/2
250
120
slow
1
275
135
slow
2
300
150
moderately slow
3
325
160
moderately slow
4
350
175*
moderate
5
375
190
moderate
6
400
205
moderately hot
7
425
220
hot
8
450
230
hot
9
475
245
very hot
* often considered 180°C
I've based this table off of a number of sources that have slightly different values; I'm going to assume that the 25°F for each gas mark is correct (as those all agree), and derived the Celcius from there, rounding to the nearest 5. See the first three for descriptive terms like 'moderate oven', as they don't all use the same adjectives.
http://www.circlecity.co.uk/kitchen/conversions/gasmark_temperatures.php
http://www.onlineconversion.com/cooking_gasmark.htm
http://www.hintsandthings.co.uk/kitchen/oventemp.htm
http://www.godecookery.com/goderec/equiv.htm
http://smittenkitchen.com/cooking-conversions/
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~mjw/recipes/cooking-faq
The descriptor column are terms used in older cookbooks, particularly in British, NZ and AU cooking. I've taken these from a trusted NZ source for baking; Edmund's Cookbook, 1993 edition.
From Charlotte Farley: endive (US) is chicory (Belgium, perhaps others). A I understand it, UK usage reverses continental usage - so the UK and US call it "endive". The rest of Europe calls it "chicory", and vice versa.
Edit by Rumtscho:
This is called "chickory" (or a clearly related word) in many continental European languages, except in Dutch. Common names in the Netherlands or Flanders are 'witloof', 'witlof' or 'Brussels lof'. (cc by-sa image by David Monniaux). It is bitter, and is often eaten as a part of a cooked dish. The root of this plant is called 'chicorei' in Dutch (so this word is related to 'chicory'), but it is used less and less (it was used as a coffee substitute).
This is called "endive" (or a closely related word) in many continental European languages, but endive or Belgian endive in the US and Canada. (cc sa-by-nc-nd image by Carlos Lorenzo). It is usually eaten raw, in a salad, interchangeably with other lettuces.* It certainly can be cooked as well (mainly the outer leaves).
There is another vegetable from the endive family. While it is commonly known as "radicchio", I've heard it referred to as "red endive". Not sure about its common use.
*sorry for the beautiful but not too recognizable picture, I couldn't find a better shareable one. Will snap it and update when I happen to buy the thing.
Further Edit by Megha :
Elsewhere, chicory is a blue flower, whose root is roasted and used as a coffee substitute. This flower is sometimes known as "root chicory" (because the roots were mostly used, I suppose), as opposed to leaf chicory, which is the endive or radicchio as mentioned above. This plant is used in the Mediterranean region, where the plant was native, and is often used in Indian coffee, and is also known in southeast Asia, South Africa, and southern United States (especially areas affected by the naval blockades during the US Civil War --Joe)
In Canada, I've always heard 1) as "Belgian Endive" and 2) as Endive.
in the netherlands 1) is called "witlof" (white leaf) or "Brussels lof". It's eaten either raw in salad, cooked, or sautee'd (sometimes baked over with cheese). 2) in the Netherlands is eaten almost universally cooked, rarely raw (though sometimes mashed raw into cooked potatoes) 3) is used in salads to provide accents in both taste and colour/texture
3 looks like red cabbage (CA).
The above would normally be named in the UK as "chicory", "Frisee" and "Radicchio" respectively. Although "Endive" would sometimes be used to refer to any of them, especially the first two.
From the book "Hamlyn All Colour Cook Book" (29th, revised impression 1992 reprinted 1997; first published in 1970), in the section "Useful facts and figures":
Notes for American and Australian users
In America the 8-fl oz measuring cup is used. In Australia metric measures are now used in conjunction with the standard 250-ml measuring cup. The Imperial pint, used in Britain and Australia, is 20 fl oz, while the American pint is 16 fl oz. It is important to remember that the Australian tablespoon differs from both the British and American tablespoons; the table below gives a comparison. The British standard tablespoon, which has been used throughout this book, holds 17.7 ml, the American 14.2 ml and the Australian 20 ml. The teaspoon holds approximately 5 ml in all three countries.
British American Australian
-------------------------------------------------
1 teaspoon 1 teaspoon 1 teaspoon
1 tablespoon 1 tablespoon 1 tablespoon
2 tablespoons 3 tablespoons 2 tablespoons
3 1/2 tablespoons 4 tablespoons 3 tablespoons
4 tablespoons 5 tablespoons 3 1/2 tablespoons
An Imperial/American guide to solid and liquid measures
Imperial American
---------------------------------
Solid Measures
1 lb butter or
margarine 2 cups
1 lb flour 4 cups
1 lb granulated or
castor sugar 2 cups
1 lb icing sugar 3 cups
8 oz rice 1 cup
Liquid measures
1/4 pint liquid 2/3 cup liquid
1/2 pint 1 1/4 cup
3/4 pint 2 cups
1 pint 2 1/2 cups
1 1/2 pints 3 3/4 cups
2 pints 5 cups (2 1/2 pints)
Note: when making any of the recipes in this book, only follow one set of measures as they are not interchangeable
There is also a question specifically on converting measurements : http://cooking.stackexchange.com/q/76/67
comment on How do you convert British recipes to American measurements? by Niall : not to mention that a 15ml tablespoon isn't a tables-poon but a dessert-spoon. Though for recipes this is now always taken to be ~15ml, older cookbooks will mean ~25ml when they use the term "table-spoon"
I love how American recipes call for cups for solid ingredients and then the author of "Cooking for Geeks" tried it with friends and the cup of flour varied by 31% in mass between the most extreme measurements. Lesson should be to weigh the ingredients if you profess to follow a recipe.
@0xC0000022L : some cookbooks (e.g., Fannie Farmer) will specifically tell you how to use the cup to measure (spoon the flour into the cup, use a knife or similar to scrape it flat without packing). If you compare that to someone who scoops using the cup, and then shakes to level it, yes, it's going to vary greatly.
Standardized can sizes (eg, "a #10 can" or "a No.1 can").
When dealing with some older US recipes, you may find recipes that mention the size of a can as a number. I have no idea if these same standards were used in other countries. (I would assume Canada, but I have no idea)
Note that this is not the same as giving a weight ("8 oz. can" or "14 oz. can"), as it's a standard about the size in terms of width & height of the can, for stacking on shelves.)
From The Spruce Eats (original link has approx weights, too; I computed mL):
Can Size Name Volume Metric
------------- ------ ------
Picnic 1 1/4 cups 300mL
12 ounces vacuum 1 1/2 cups 360mL
No. 1 1 1/3 cup 320mL
No. 1 tall 2 cups 480mL
No. 1 square 2 cups 480mL
No. 2 2-1/2 cups 600mL
No. 2 1/2 3-1/2 cups 840mL
No. 2 1/2 square scant 4 cups ~940mL?
No. 3 5-3/4 cups 1380mL (see below)
No. 3 squat 2-3/4 cups 660mL
No. 5 7-1/3 cups 1760mL
No. 10 12 cups 2880mL (see below)
No. 300 1-3/4 cups 420mL
No. 303 2 cups 480mL
Note: "scant" means "slightly less than". The link also has a discussion of why certain foods were packaged in certain sizes.
The above chart slightly disagrees with the one from The University of Nebrasca-Lincoln which says that "No.1" and "Picnic" are the same size (1-1/4c.), but does say they are "Can size approximations".
Sizes.com gives height and diameter of various can sizes, but there's no mention if these are internal or external measurements. Oddly, their definition of a #3 can (4-3/16" dia, 4-7/8" high) would be ~67 cu.in, or 4.6 cups if I'm doing my math right ... more than a cup less than every other definition I've found) They say a #3 can is 32 fl.oz (4cups; 950mL), and a "#3 tall" seems to match everyone else's definition for a #3 (46 fl.oz; ~1360mL)
Sizes.com also disagrees with every other site about #10 cans -- they say it's 1 gallon (16cups; 3785mL) while other sites say 12cups (2840mL).
Supposedly, there were ten original sizes designated (#1 through #10, and the three digit ones came later, along with the modified types. I've also found a few others that weren't mentioned in the Spruce Eats link. (I've derived some measurements for completeness):
#1 Juice : 1-5/8 cups (13 fl.oz; 390mL)
#2 short : 1-3/4c. (14 fl.oz; 420mL)
#2 tall : 3c. (24 fl.oz; 720mL)
#202 : 1/2 c. (4fl.oz; 120mL)
#202 tall : 5/8 c. (5fl. oz; 150mL)
#211 : 1-1/2 cups (360mL)
#3 tall : 5-3/4c. (46 fl.oz; 1360mL)
#3 Cylinder : 5-3/4 cups (46 fl.oz; 1360mL)
#6 : 8 cups (64 fl.oz; 1893mL based on "double the capacity of the No. 3")
American and UK flour designations do not line up well, as American flour has significant variability by brand
UK flour:
Plain flour : 8-10% protein
Strong flour : 12-14% protein
US Cake and Pastry Flour
Swan’s Down Cale Flour : (6-8%)
Softasilk Bleached Cake Flour : 6.9%
Bob’s Red Mill Super Fine Pastry Flour : (7-8%)
King Arthur Unbleached White Pastry Flour : 8%
King Arthur Unbleached Cake Flour : 9.4%
US All Purpose Flour
Pillsbury AP : 8%
White Lily AP : 9%
Gold Medal AP : 10.5%
Bob’s Red Mill AP : 11%
King Arthur AP : 11.7%
US Bread Flour:
Pillsbury Best Bread Flour : 12%
King Arthur Unbleached Bread Flour : 12.7%
Bob’s Red Mill Artisan Bread Flour : 13%
Gold Medal Bread Flour : 13.3%
White Lily Unbleached Bread Flour : 13.3%
Boiling potatoes (US) are waxy potatoes (UK, US). This refers to
low-starch potatoes that don't fall apart when cooked. Sometimes
called roasting potatoes (US). New potatoes behave like waxy potatoes,
even if they come from a variety used for baking.
You roast floury potatoes not waxy one
Not in the US we don’t. “Roasted potatoes” are cut into chunks (or smaller potatoes), tossed in oil, then put in the oven. Floury potatoes are used for what we call “baked potatoes” where they’re put in the oven whole (possibly wrapped in foil, what the Brits would call a ‘jacket potato’) and let cook until the middle can be easily mashed. Americans don’t consider that to be ‘roasted’, they consider it ‘baked’. Why? I have no idea.
@Joe so we roast the same way, try using floury potatoes, you get a lovely crispy outside, Maris Piper is the current fav variety in the UK.
they sell potato by color more than by named variety here (white, red, yellow, purple). There are some exceptions (russet, red bliss, Yukon gold, fingerlings), but in general a store in the US only has 3-4 types unless they’ve also got a variety of sizes
@Joe farmers markets or greengrocers? Are you saying you have no idea if you have bought waxy or floury pots until you cook them?
They sell russets (floury), red (waxy), yellow (sorta in between), and white (which I think are waxy). Sometimes ‘new’ potato’s, which are waxy, too
Unless you’re going to some specialty grocer or maybe a farmer’s market, most vegetables in the US aren’t majorly differentiated. An international grocery store might have 4 types of sweet potato, but your basic American supermarket has one (unless they have smaller ones in bag at a higher price). Onions are one of the exceptions: they might label them ‘walla walla’ or ‘vidalia’, but odds are it all gets rung up as ‘sweet onion’ because of how the product codes were made. About the only fresh produce that we have names for are apples
@Joe try russets next time, i promise you will see the difference, 5-10 min par boil, get the fat lovely and hot in the oven, you will get a lovely crispy outside, and inside like baked potatoes
I roast all sorts of potatoes. (Typically, I just buy yellow potatoes and use them for everything), but it’s the American grocery stores that sometimes label waxy potatoes as ‘roasting potatoes’. I know I’ve discussed the stupid ways in which potatoes are sold in the US on here, but all I’m finding is the comment on https://cooking.stackexchange.com/a/114967/67
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.753305
| 2010-07-12T20:53:35 |
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103824
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Is it safe to drink dark tea dating to 1970?
The tea has been saved in a glass bottle with metal top, stored in dark kitchen cabinet all these years.
Safe probably yes, you will use boiling water (or as close to boiling water).
Will it be good ? maybe.
It will probably taste stale,
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.758002
| 2019-11-30T19:47:25 |
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"url": "https://cooking.stackexchange.com/questions/103824",
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|
101209
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Seasoning a carbon steel wok
I have a carbon steel wok but it became rusty recently when I forgot something in it for a day.
I decided to scrub everything off and re-season it. The problem is I can't get the center of the wok to be seasoned. No matter how much oil I add, it burns and disappears leaving the center as bare metal...
My method is applying a very thin layer of oil and making it burn on the gas, then when it's dry (and not seasoned...) I rub more oil. It worked for everywhere except the middle.
Should I scrub off everything again and start over? If not, what should I do?
It sounds to me like you are using too much heat to allow the seasoning process to work, instead the oil is burning off before it can polymerize and form the seasoning layer.
The bits that are already seasoned probably don't need to be re-seasoned; you can add seasoning to the areas where it is not seasoned. You may want to do multiple layers to ensure that the coatings are even across the whole pan.
I suspect that what you need to do, as you have been rubbing thin layers of oil over the surface, but then use a lower heat setting and ensure that the pan is fully heated through over as much of the pan as you can get hot and at constant temperature. One way to do this is to heat it in an oven, rather than over a flame.
Wow thanks that makes sense!! Ive stupidly used the highest flame so it gave too much heat to the center! I dont have any oven but i will try tomorrow with lower heat and once again make my whole appartment smell like burnt tire lol
See video from Serious Eats, which supports Bob's answer; you'll notice that Daniel moves the wok around in order to avoid concentrating the flame in one spot: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndv-uT94BGM
Hi so i tried seasoning it again after removing the old seasoning (with vinegar and baking soda and lot of scrubbing lol) but when i tried to do it again with lower flame here is what happened https://imgur.com/gallery/9xHfndA i am sur i didnt put too much oil but how come it made drops instead of a layer? Is that the pattern on my towels showing off? Im really confused now... And this bad seasoning didnt last a week (i only cooked greasy meat and vegetables with meat...)
Per Bob's answer and my link, you really need to move the wok around to get it evenly heated.
This is long, but effective seasoning and re-seasoning from scratch...
Wok "Chi", also known as Wok "Hei" is one of the main reasons that professionals and knowledgeable cooks choose Carbon Steel Woks over non-stick Teflon, Cast Iron and Stainless Steel Woks. Those others cannot produce that subtle flavoring that comes with properly polymerized seasoning in a Carbon Steel Wok. Yes, the others will cook food, but only properly seasoned carbon steel can impart that unique added subtle flavoring that makes Wok meals taste so good!
I have not found the instructions included with most Chinese-made Woks to be optimum and I use a somewhat different method for an initial seasoning that works far better in my opinion. The vinegar method that the instructions often call for might work well, but I chose a different method and have been pleased with the results. You can use either one, or Google "Wok Seasoning" to find a plethora of seasoning methods. Here's what I do with great results...and one that will mitigate a number of problems that people have elucidated and complained about their carbon steel Woks.
The first step is to run water as hot as you can get it from your faucet and heat the wok with running water. Then I use Dawn dish soap and a stainless steel scrub pad to vigorously scrub the wok, both inside and out. This will NOT remove all the coating but will start softening or prepping the coating for the next step. I do this for about five minutes vigorously to the whole Wok.
After rinsing out the Wok, I pour a small, but a generous pile of Coarse Kosher Salt in the bottom of the Wok pan. To the salt, I add a little cooking oil (At this point it doesn't matter what oil you use). Enough to be able to lightly coat the salt. Then using the same scrubbing pad, I vigorously scrub the salt inside and outside the Wok. I mean REALLY scrub! Again, this will not completely remove the coating or old seasoning, but that will come next...
After rinsing and drying the wok, I take it to my outside Concord 200,000BTU Gas Banjo Burner and its Whirlpool Cast Iron Wok Ring (both available on Amazon) and prepare to completely remove the coating and get down to bare carbon steel.
(NOTE: my method works faster because I have super high heat capability with the Banjo Burner. That being said, you can do exactly the same thing with a stovetop burner, but it will take patience and time to complete. It's a one-time operation, so do it right, take your time, and you'll never have to do it again!)
There should be NO oil in the Wok for this step. Just a dry Wok. Kick up whatever you are using for heat to its highest setting. Make sure you have a heat mitt or pad for your hand, and I also suggest having a pair of Channel Grips (Long-handled pliers) available that will make the process much easier by being able to maneuver the Wok from various edges...not just the handle.
Place the WOK on the heat and wait. It might take a minute or two, but you will begin to see a change in color in the middle of the Wok pan. Keep it there until you see the color change spread to where it isn't spreading further at the same pace. The pan will start to lighten up where it is changing and may look totally silver, but not necessarily that color for it to get to that level. Once the color change has slowed, start slowly rotating the Wok towards its edges and follow the color changes up to the rim. Follow the sides around, using the handle and then the channel grips to get the color change completely showing from the center to the rim. Don't worry about damaging the Wok. It will only damage the Wok if you allow the metal to get to glowing RED hot. Very difficult to get it that far. Use the channel grips to make sure you include the area up to the rim of where the handle is welded to the pan. Once you have accomplished this, turn off the burner and let the Wok come to just above room temperature where you can handle it with bare hands. DO NOT use water to try and cool it faster.
Back to the sink and repeat steps 1 and 2. Dry completely! At this point, the factory coating or old seasoning should be completely removed. There may be a small bit on the back of the Wok, but who cares at this point. It will eventually burn off and we are more concerned with the internal pan than the outside.
From this point on, you are never going to use soap again! You will clean your Wok after cooking with nothing but hot water and a stiff bamboo Wok cleaning whisk or something like a green scrub pad. That's all you'll need!
That completes the initial burn of the Wok to prepare it for initial and regular seasoning. Let's go...
The purpose of seasoning a Wok is to provide a surface that over time will make the Wok cook evenly and essentially non-stick. As mentioned earlier, it also provides the base for creating that unique Wok Chi experience that will excite your taste buds. Here's my method for initial seasoning and maintaining the seasoning.
Choose the oil or fat that you intend to use. It should be a high smoke point oil or fat. Do NOT use Olive oil for this initial seasoning. It has too low of a smoke point. Plant oil options include Grapeseed, Avocado, Coconut, Crisco, or as I prefer...Crisbee Pucks (Amazon) that are made from Palm Oil and Bees Wax. You can use regular vegetable oil like Canola or Peanut oil as well. A number of people on Google and youtube push the use of Flax Seed Oil as being superior, but many studies and experiences have shown that it is not the "end all" for seasoning. The use of flax oil can flake later when used as a base seasoning, and frankly, you don't want to see flakes of hardened oil in your food. Additionally, I strongly recommend you do NOT use any animal-based fat for the initial seasoning. Those fats can easily become rancid in some conditions and can spoil your food...and potentially your health. They also do not polymerize to the surface as well as vegetable fats. Later, animal-based fats and Olive Oil can be used for general Wok cooking once the Wok has been properly seasoned.
Turn on the heat to medium to medium-high. Heat the wok for a couple of minutes and then turn the heat off. This will help open the "pores" of the metal to receive oil
Using the oil of your choice, put in just enough to create about a quarter-sized dollop. With a lint-free paper towel or a lint-free cloth, spread a thin layer of the oil all over the inner bowl and then the outside as well. Once you have an oil sheen on the Wok, fold some of those paper towels and wipe out the whole Wok, inside and outside. Wipe it until it appears dry of oil! What you need is a micro-layer of oil on the WOK. You should NOT be able to visibly see any oil. It is there, so don't worry. It's just barely on the surface and working into the pores of the metal.
If seasoning inside your home, now is the time to open your windows and doors and use any fans or vents you have because you are about to smoke up your house a bit. You might even consider turning off your smoke detectors. If you can do this outside...all the better.
Put your Wok on the heat source and turn it up to HIGH. You are waiting for the smoke point of the fat you used. As it begins to smoke, rotate the Wok as you did in the original coating removal and make sure all areas of the Wok are reached. Once the smoke has stopped, remove the Wok from the heat source and let it cool down by itself to a point that you can handle it without burning yourself
6 Under HOT running water, now wash the Wok without soap. Do not worry about losing the first seasoning layer you just completed...it won't! ONLY WATER. Dry the Wok completely and if necessary put it over low to medium heat to help it dry.
Now for the fun part... Do steps 3-6 at least two to three more times and preferably four to six times more. Make sure that each time you only use a very small amount of oil, and only enough to barely leave a micro-oil surface over the last one.
First cook for final seasoning...
Now we need to actually cook in the WOK to add aromatics and the final initial seasoning to your Wok. As you continue to cook after this step, the color of your Wok will eventually darken and may even get almost entirely black. This is a GOOD thing. It will also be virtually non-stick.
Prepare some aromatic veggies to use for the first cook. These include peeled fresh Ginger Slices, Green onions - scallions (cut about 1" long), and coarse onion slices. About a large handful or roughly two cups worth.
Choose an oil that you are likely to use regularly to cook food in your Wok. I generally choose either Peanut Oil or Avocado oil. Begin heating your Wok on High Heat.
When you can sprinkle some water in the wok and it evaporates instantly, put about 2 Tablespoons of oil in the Wok.
Add your chopped veggies. They should start to fry almost immediately. Start moving them all the time. Don't let them sit for long.
Using a Wok Spatula or similar, continue moving the cooking veggies all over the Wok pan. Push the veggies up to the rim of the Wok repeatedly to coat with a bit of the hot, cooking oil and keep moving them around.
Keep doing that until you literally have burned the veggies to almost blackened, ensuring that you have consistently kept them making frequent contact with the entire Wok bowl. Once blackened, take the Wok off the heat and as it begins to cool, discard the veggies and the remaining oil. Wipe out the wok with a paper towel.
Take the Wok to your sink and using HOT WATER (NEVER use cold water on a hot or warm Wok!!) Rinse out the Wok and using the same technique as previously mentioned after each seasoning cycle, scrub out the Wok WITHOUT soap.
Once cleaned of food debris, dry your Wok well and use heat if necessary.
Using the same technique for applying a micro-layer of oil for seasoning, do the same to the Wok once it is dry. Make sure you wipe excess oil from the Wok so that you can hardly tell there is oil on the surface. It's there...It's OK!
You can now store your Wok until you are ready to use next time without fear of rust forming. Follow the procedures from Steps 7-9 for all future Wok use.
You have now completed the entire process of preparing your Wok for regular cooking. Just ensure that you use a little oil, wiped clean, to store your Wok after use. The seasoning, non-stick properties, and color will continue to get better and better over time.
I have written this long review to address some of the concerns and complaints that have been prevalent from novice Carbon Steel Wok users. I hope that this will help you not only to decide to start "Wok'ing", but also to allay your fears about seasoning and properly maintaining a Wok. This process is workable for virtually any Carbon Steel Wok. I have seasoned and re-seasoned MANY carbon steel woks. Through much experimentation and angst, this is the MOST effective method I have found works. Bon Appetit!
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.758082
| 2019-09-06T22:02:37 |
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125093
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Is the liquid inside the canned chickpeas meant for consumption?
Can the liquid inside the canned chickpeas be consumed?
Should I drain it or add it to the chickpea-curry?
Does this answer your question? What is the food chemistry of aquafaba?
@user366312, are you intending to ask a food safety question? Because that's what your title expresses, but your main text says "should I". Please be more clear.
@bob1 actually, the rules of duplicates are "only when the question matches". If it's a different question, it's not closed, even if the answers would duplicate one another, or if the answer to one would imply the answer to the other.
Adam Ragusea addresses bean juice https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JfgDxMFn0X4
Assuming you meant to ask a food safety question, otherwise this is a duplicate:
The liquid in the can with your chickpeas is food safe; otherwise, there would be no way for the beans themselves to be safe. There are two reasons you wouldn't want to eat it:
The bean broth can be very salty, as some canned beans use the brine method
Canned bean broth can be high in BPA depending on a number of factors
My understanding is that draining the liquid also reduces the probability of flatulence, as well.
This is true, the fermentable carbs in the beans (AKA FODMAPs) are water soluble so canned beans, when drained, will have less fermentable carbs. Regular not canned chickpeas are very high in galacto-oligosacharrides.
It depends on what you’re making whether you want to use it or not.
If you’re cooking something that just calls for chickpeas, you probably don’t want to use it. Especially if they tell you to rinse off the beans if you’re using canned.
But because the liquid is high in protein, it can be used as an egg white replacement. (Look up ‘aquafaba’). You just have to beware of an increased amount of salt that you may need to adjust the recipe for.
Yes, and it can be very useful, as another answer states. We use chickpea aquafaba to make meringues, and in other recipes as an egg replacer, and it works quite well. Look up recipes for a few ideas!
Here is one from a quick search: https://www.sprinklebakes.com/2020/04/chickpea-water-or-aquafaba-meringue.html
Also, if you want to avoid exposure to plastics, you can cook your own in a pressure cooker, like an Instapot, in pretty short order, and it's very economical.
We used this in cakes!
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.759003
| 2023-08-28T19:37:39 |
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|
97431
|
How to make good quality onion powder at home?
I chopped some onion and put it in an old gas oven. It had 3 issues:
Some pieces or parts of pieces are burned while other pieces are
still not dehydrated.
It sticks with the bottom of the aluminum plate.
It has a bitter taste.
How can I solve the 3 issues to produce high quality onion powder at home?
An oven isn't a very good dehydrator: it's too hot and not enough air circulation. Dehydrators are pretty cheap, and it's not hard to make your own with something like a space heater and a fan.
It's likely that your oven, even on the coolest setting, is too hot. That's why the onion burnt, and the bitterness comes from the burnt bits.
I occasionally use my electric oven for dehydrating fruit and veg but mine goes down to 50°C. I tend to preheat it to about 100°C and turn it down when the food had been in for a few minutes, at which point I open the door as well.
A gas oven has another problem - burning gas produces water vapour, which makes drying harder even with ventilation (you really do need the door ajar to let the steam out). Drying on a rack (borrowed from a grill pan, or a cake cooling rack) makes a huge difference.
I also have a dehydrator, but it's not all that much better than the oven for a small batch in winter, so I leave it stored away except when I've got a lot to dry. It wins on capacity and the fact I can run it outside - worthwhile for chillies and presumably onions.
All very well put. Drying chilies indoors is absolutely awful.
@GdD A mistake you should only make once, but I made it twice: first in the oven then in the dehydrator. Now I run it ouside on a nice the sun helps with the drying.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.759222
| 2019-04-12T01:24:35 |
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|
117512
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Defrosting Waitrose Chilled Chicken Kiev
I had Essential Waitrose Chilled chicken Kiev’s in the freezer for three months and then defrosted them in 8 hours and cooked them. Is it safe to eat them after being defrosted and then cooked like this?
Also can you get food poisoning from eating chicken that was defrosted too long before cooking?
Where did you defrost it? In the fridge -> no problem. On the counter -> problem.
Welcome to the site. Does this answer your question?
Thank you for your answer. It was actually ok although I defrosted it on a counter but next time I’ll always defrost in the fridge as it is otherwise a risk.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.759368
| 2021-10-14T19:40:36 |
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123330
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Can I substitute Dried Anchovies with Fresh Anchovies?
I'm trying to make the broth part of Maanchi's tteokbokki recipe and it calls for dried anchovies. I'm on a bit of a time crunch so getting them online isn't the best and the closest Asian market is hours away. Could fresh Anchovies replace the dried ones?
I don’t know how the anchovies are processed when they’re dried, so I can’t give any sort of definitive answer. There might be some fermentation going on, as there is in the Japanese katsuobishi (which will likely be even more difficult to find). If they’re just looking for the umami, kombu (dried seaweed) might work. I’ve also gotten dried shrimp at Latin grocery stores before. If available, I’d probably use shrimp paste before I used straight up canned or fresh sardines. Worst case scenario is to make something with what you have on hand, and save this recipe for another day
And I just looked up the recipe ( https://www.maangchi.com/recipe/tteokbokki ) and it already calls for kombu… but you might be able to use fish sauce, I just don’t know the amount to use to replace a set amount of dried fish. But add the fish sauce towards the end of cooking the broth
Hi. What do you mean by "fresh anchovies"? Most anchovies are either salted and air dried, or salted in brine and preserved under oil. If the latter, I suppose it would work. Maybe mince/chop them finely before using.
@BillyKerr anchovies are pretty commonly available fresh as well as salted. Neither is particularly similar to dried (unsalted) anchovies.
This has kinda-sorta been answered already, here: https://cooking.stackexchange.com/q/56704/7180
@Sneftel - I have never seen fresh anchovies available for sale, not even at the fish mongers, but I suppose it depends where you come from. There aren't any anchovies in the North Sea. We have small fish such as sprats, but they're not quite the same. Another alternative might be fish sauce.
Speaking as someone who has made this broth, it will not work. Fresh anchovies will add too much oil and will break up in the broth, making it cloudy and too fishy. You really want to look at other dried ingredients.
The answers to this question cover a fair range of what those dried ingredients could be.
The purpose of broth in teokkbokki is generally just to give some depth to it, and is not vital to the flavor profile as some other recipes. (other strong flavors will cover most of it up anyway)
Dried anchovies or kombu is still the most orthodox option due to being considered to offer the most umami without influencing the flavor too much, but they can be somewhat replaced with other types of broth. Bone broth or beef stock also have their fans - although you will taste them much more than you would anchovy broth in the final product, which may be a plus if you like the meaty flavor.
Basically, most other standard broth or stock should work alright, and even just water works in a pinch - although as Maangchi says, it will be lacking a bit of oomph in that case.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.759463
| 2023-02-08T14:26:52 |
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42698
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Are there unnoticable effects of cooked food going bad?
I've seen and heard the statement that bacteria will create toxins that will remain, despite reheating. (eg How long can cooked food be safely stored at room/warm temperature?)
I get all of that, and realize that it's taking a chance to eat food that's been in room temperature for an extended period of time.
I've never really cared, and often finished cooking something for the next day, turning off the stove right before i go to bed, and then putting it in the fridge in the morning, and thought that "it's fine, I'll just heat it properly later".
I've never had any sort of food poisoning in connection to this, at least that I've noticed. Guess that's the reason I never cared.
Recently I realized this might be very stupid. So: Is there anything long term dangerous in this situation that won't be noticable at all short term (not even nausea)?
Edit:
I don't know if this might be more suitable to Seasoned Advice - I guess my question really is regarding health:
When leaving food in room temperature, a number of bacteria etc will invade the food. Some will be "poisonous" themselves, some will create toxins. Some effects are immediate, some occur after 3-7 days.
If I do this from time to time, and nothing seems to happen within a week, does that mean that the concentrations of toxins simply was too low, and I'm "off the hook" this time?
Or are there any effects with a longer incubation time?
It sounds like you're asking if there are any long-term effects of frequently eating improperly stored food, assuming you don't get food poisoning. Unfortunately, I think that's beyond Seasoned Advice's scope, as we're not a health site, and we don't have any particular expertise in medical questions like that...
I am with derobert here. Health is specifically listed as off-topic on the site. Food safety is an exception, but under strict rules. And the best way of defining what is food safety, as opposed to long term health effect is exactly that, restricting food safety topics to things which send you to the hospital (or at least the toilet) the next day. Consuming the byproducts of bacteria over years is as off-topic as consuming food from aluminum pans over years.
@rumtscho: Not necessarily the next day. Common cases of food poisoning (salmonella, e.coli, etc.) can take 3-7 days for visible symptoms. That's why so many people who make bad food safety decisions seem to think they're just fine; they make themselves sick and then misattribute their illness to something they ate more recently (probably at a restaurant).
I realize that this at least borders on being off-topic. I will try to reword this slightly to see if I can be more specific.
"The next day" was an imprecise generalization. I had understood that you are frequently eating food which has some level of bacteria-created toxins (but too low to produce acute symptoms) and you are asking if it has long term health effects. Now I see that your question was more intended to be about the incubation period for acute symptoms. But in both cases, this is a health question, and out of scope. If you are interested in details of food borne disease described at a layperson level, the "FDA bad bugs book" is a great source. It is a free (as in beer) e-book, just google it.
Yes, some bacteria do not produce immediately visible results, and molds are not visible until they reach the stage where they begin to produce their fruiting body (the part you see, is actually the organ they use to reproduce).
There are of course some signs that the food is irreverably compromised including:
Off smells, especially fermented or putrecent odors
Off tastes
Sliminess
Visible mold
Bubbles
Still, you cannot count on one of these signs being apparent. You will have to assess your own tolerance for risk.
I should perhaps clarify. I'm talking about overnight, when the food looks, smells and taste alright, and I don't get any symptoms the following days.
There is no possible way I will assert in a public forum anything in conflict with the FDA and other reputable agency recommendations. You must assess your own tolerance for risk. Remember, just because the dog hasn't bit you yet doesn't mean it won't.
@SAJ14SAJ: This dog is more than willing to assert that food authorities are often very far on the safe side: for healthy adults, leaving cooked food at room temperature for a day is almost always perfectly fine. By room temperature I mean 18–20 degrees. If you room is 30 degrees, I'd put it in the fridge.
@Cerberus: Yeah, this is Sweden, so >25 degrees almost never even happen. The thing that bothers me is Aaronauts comment on my original post.
@NiklasJ: I wouldn't worry about it, but it's your choice. One of the most unhealthy by-products of fungi that we are regulalry exposed to is alcohol, but small amounts have no effect on one's health.
It is absolutely true... food born illness almost always takes at least 24 hours, often longer as Aaronut indicated, to manifest.
|
Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.759728
| 2014-03-12T16:01:33 |
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|
21124
|
Rice cooker problem: film appears after cooking
What is this and why does it appear?
It always happened, maybe I cook rice the wrong way, or maybe it comes from the rice itself...
I wash the rice with water before, at least 3-4 times. I don't even cook it until it's completely done, I stop it before today in order to check if it's due to overcooked rice or not. It isn't.
It is perfectly okay to eat. I am going to assume when you cook rice, the rice comes out a bit too moist. The "film" is literally the water and the starch from the rice that has dried and turned into a thin film of rice starch.
If you like your rice the way it currently is, then there is nothing to worry about. But if it indeed is too moist, then decrease the amount of water you use to cook the rice.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.760131
| 2012-02-07T18:13:41 |
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|
128707
|
How long can home-made sausages stay in a fridge without risking botulism?
Let say I make make two sausages from scratch. The sausages contains 10% water and 1.5% salt (sodium chloride) with respect to the amout of meat per kg. They do not include nitrate or nitrite.
I boil one sausage for 10 minutes and then I put both sausages in a fridge with 3.8C/33F.
These sex conditions should now hold for both sausages.
Absence of oxygen
Low Acid
Low Salt
High moisture
Low sugar
Temperature (higher than 4.4C/44F [1])
Is there any risk the uncooked, or both sausages can cause botulism after a week in the fridge? Do I need to re-boil the already cooked sausage to make it safe to eat?
The purpose of this question is to get an answer regarding risk of botulism with raw sausages in a fridge. This seems very close to leaving garlic in oil for too long in the fridge, which is unsafe. However, one of the samples are cooked and one is not. Will the risk regarding boutalism be different?
Refs:
[1]https://www.fda.gov/files/food/published/Fish-and-Fishery-Products-Hazards-and-Controls-Guidance-Chapter-13-Download.pdf
What is the lowest temperature at which botulism spores are killed?
Isn't this just the usual uncooked/partially cooked meat situation? I would assume that the inside of a sausage is not anaerobic but perhaps I'm wrong.
If you are worried about safety, botulism is unlikely, what would be much more likely are E. Coli, salmonella, Clostridium perfringens and Staphylococcus aureus.
I know people are confused here and always try to supply many details in the hope of finding exceptions to food safety rules. It doesn't work that way! Unless you made your sausages from a recipe that is designed and tested to be in the next-more-shelf-stable-category, they are just like any other cooked food.
I want this question to focus on butalism, because IMO, it seems all conditions are true. @dbmag9, (Homemade) Salami has a risk of having boutalism because there is no air inside them. Do you mean that sausage not dried can' have that?
@Bojack that's not how food safety works, please see https://cooking.stackexchange.com/tags/food-safety/info. Your line of thinking contains several of the misconceptions listed there. In short, you get a binary "safe/not safe" judgement, and hear if the food needs to be kept refrigerated or not. For a few unusual cases, it might be common knowledge why the food falls into the unexpected category (garlic-in-oil because of botulism) but in general, food safety rules are simplified, straightforward, and don't answer "why".
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.760341
| 2024-07-01T19:06:43 |
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|
114069
|
Why did my bagels flatten?
This weekend, I made Peter Reinhart's water bagel recipe from The Bread Baker's Apprentice. The bagels taste yummy, but they're flat wrinkly discs! What can I do next time to get nice puffy bagels instead?
The recipe is basically:
make a sponge and let it ferment for 2 hours
add more yeast, salt, flour, and sweetener (I used Wheat Montana all-purpose flour, which yes is all-purpose but has a protein content closer to bread flour...so I was hoping it would behave more like bread flour)
knead (I kneaded for about 20 minutes, until I got a nice smooth dough that passed the windowpane test)
divide, form into rolls, rest for 20 minutes
form bagels (after I was done forming them all I also went back and stretched out some of the first bagels I'd shaped a bit more)
let rest for 20 minutes and then do the float test (mine passed the float test after the 20 minutes)
Here's what the bagels looked like at that point:
put in refrigerator for up to 2 days (I had them in there for a little more than 24 hours)
take out of the fridge and boil as soon as they pass the float test (mine did right away), 1 minute on each side. This is where things started going wrong. Mine puffed up nicely in the water, but then they started to deflate as soon as I took them out.
bake. I saw my somewhat deflated boiled bagels and thought "they'll spring up in the oven!" but alas...basically no oven spring. You can see the result above.
The finished bagels are tasty and chewy, and the crumb is somewhat dense but not THAT bad:
But they're so flat!! The uncooked formed bagels almost look taller, like they spread out during/after boiling instead of poofing UP.
Here are my current hypotheses about what could have happened:
I think I added the extra instant yeast and salt to the fermented sponge at the same time, so maybe the salt killed some of the yeast? But the bagels did poof up and pass the float test, so the yeast must have been active enough for that.
I was using all-purpose flour instead of bread or high-gluten flour, and my understanding is that higher-gluten flour soaks up more water. So maybe the dough was too wet, using the same amount of water with all-purpose flour? I also didn't end up adding all of the flour the recipe called for - I was trying to pay attention to the dough foremost, so I stopped when it seemed to have a nice consistency with just a couple tablespoons of flour left to go. However, other bagel recipes (like this one https://cooking.nytimes.com/guides/81-how-to-make-bagels) say you can use all purpose flour yet have an even higher hydration, and my dough did feel quite dry.
Another potential downfall of that all-purpose flour: maybe there wasn't enough gluten development to hold up to the boiling. But I did knead it extensively, got the dough texture Reinhart describes, and have seen other bagel recipes that use all purpose flour without such flat results. Moreover, it seems like people recommend bread/high-gluten flour for "extra chewy" bagels, not poofier ones...and mine were chewy enough for my tastes.
It seems like some other bagel recipes call for only 30 seconds of boiling on each side, so maybe my 1-minute on each side boil killed too much of the yeast to get a nice oven spring? But Reinhart's book says you can boil it for up to two minutes if you want extra chewy bagels.
What do you think? What should I try next time to get poofier happier bagels?
Update
Per Johanna's diagnosis of overproofing, I tried halving the yeast and then otherwise making the bagels as I did above (just with a bit of extra rise time for the sponge), and they turned out so much better!!
I pulled out a couple after 4 hours in the fridge, and they puffed up well but were not particularly flavorful. The rest I took out and boiled after 24 hours, and those were great!
I've made these before! We called them "beagles" because they are sad and floppy. See Johanna's answer for why.
This made me wonder what would happen when baking bagels in zero G
DK: the number of technical hurdles you'd need to overcome to do that in the first place is so huge that I can't even speculate.
Your finished bagels actually look like a gradient - on the left they look quite good, and on the right they are... less so. When you boiled them from the fridge, did you do them one at a time? If yes, Which ones went in first? Do you remember where each bagel was in the fridge? The better ones may have been colder.
@J...you are probably on to something...there were a couple bagels in one corner of the fridge that actually got a little frosty, and those ones were some of the puffiest.
Bagels tend to flatten when you remove them from the water if the dough is overproofed or you boiled them for too long. Next time, let them proof for shorter time in the fridge (I find that doughs get overproofed in the refrigerator after about 12 hours, so 24 hours is a very long cold proof) and possibly boil them slightly shorter.
Hmm. The thing is that Reinhart says you can leave them in the fridge for up to 48 hours, so I was well within that limit. But when I make them again I'll try pulling some out earlier and see if that helps.
Sheesania: gonna support Johanna here. I've had the overproofing problem too, with exactly the same results as your flat bagels. Is it possible that the bagels, in the fridge, got warm from opening the door, or other issues? I'm not talking warm-warm, I'm talking even just 50F/10C. That can be enough to turn an overnight fridge hold into overproofing. Personally, I don't do the overnight rise anymore because of this issue.
Note that Reinhart has access to a walk-in fridge that maintains a constant 40F in all locations. Most of the rest of us don't.
@FuzzyChef Absolutely. I always have dough in my fridge, typically for up to about three days. It really matters where the dough goes - in warm spots the dough goes flat and dead. You really need to find the cold corners of the fridge to keep dough for more than 12-24h.
+1. I'd add the temperature of the dough when it goes into the fridge is also a significant factor, as well as the airflow within the fridge which influences how rapidly they cool down. There are so many variables involved with a fridge proof I'd consider any times in a recipe to be guidelines with a +/- 500% accuracy.
An unpredictable fridge makes a ton of sense! I put them in around 2pm and was in and out of the fridge all the rest of the day...plus as I mentioned above, there were a couple bagels in one corner that got kind of frosty and ended up puffing up more than others. So overproofing does seem likely. Thanks y'all - now to figure out how to adjust the recipe.
Besides Johanna's overproofing hypothesis (which I find very likely), it seems you boiled them straight from the fridge. I would never do that, dough behaves much better when it is allowed a long warm up step after having been in the fridge.
I don't think the gluten content of the flour contributed anything to the deflation. While bagels are indeed made with high-gluten flour (actually higher than bread flour, there is a table in Bread Baker's apprentice I believe, check it out), you can get perfectly good rise out of all-purpose flour, and many breads are baked with all-purpose flour. Of all the probable causes you are listing, only the first one - added yeast - sounds like it can cause these symptoms. The more yeast you add, the less time you have before it overproofs.
Could you clarify what you mean by the dough "behaving better" if it's warmed up? I might as well give it a try though!
Unless of course it's overproofed, in which case you let it warm up and it's so limp it won't hold its shape to get it into the water
@joe Indeed, if it has both problems (overpoofed and used from cold) then fixing the second won't help with the first. And I agree that overproofing is probably also present in this case. But when OP solves the first one, they should also take care of the second, to see good results.
@sheesania by "behaving better" I would say that it behaves as usual, just like doing it without cooling it. If you use it from cold, you can get all kinds of unpleasantness happening, but the likeliest is no rise at all, or off texture, or whatever else can happen when the yeast is asleep.
If the dough is warmer/room temp, it both ensures that the water temp won't drop during your boil and that the boiling water can more or less immediately work to create steam in your bagel's air pockets (allowing it to puff up more) and gelatinize starches. If your dough is cold from the fridge, then you're spending your boil time hardening the crust while the water brings the bagel up to a less cold temperature. I think peak gelatinization happens around 90°F, so if your dough is 35°F straight from the fridge that's a big internal temperature gap to cross before the outer crust is too cooked.
@Allison, that makes a ton of sense, thanks. And I suppose once the outer crust has hardened, there's only so much the rest can expand!
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.760558
| 2021-02-02T17:43:17 |
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|
125594
|
Getting soft, but not sweet onions
Is there a way to cook onion soft, but have them retain the nutty flavor? Every time I cook them over low heat, they turn soft after a while. I want them to loose their crunchy texture, but not the nutty flavor.
Welcome to SA! Onions are not normally described as "nutty", so it's hard to answer your question. What particular flavor of onions are you trying to describe?
It's also confusing because you say "not have them retain the nutty flavor" and then you also say "not loose(sic) the nutty flavor" so you don't want it, or you do...? Please [edit] to clarify. If you're objecting to caramelization (which "not sweet" implies) try even lower temperatures.
You can saute them on medium high heat for a few minutes and stir. They won't burn if you stir frequently but you'll need to watch them carefully so as not to turn completely soft.
If you do want them completely soft and not caramelized, you can add a pinch of baking soda, which will break down the onions and turn them brown without caramelizing and turning sweet.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.761223
| 2023-10-19T14:34:41 |
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|
114613
|
Mistakenly put KitchenAid spiralizer in the dishwasher
Mistakenly put KitchenAid spiralizer in the dishwasher, and now when you touch the main body the paint comes off on the hands.
Is there any way to remedy this, and was the spiralizer damaged by this mistake of putting it in the dishwasher?
I don't know that we can really help you with this but fortunately KitchenAid has a pretty good reputation for support. You can try contacting them at https://www.kitchenaid.com/resources/contact-us.html
I’m voting to close this question because it's really a product customer support question, not in the purview of cooks.
@Tetsujin the maintaining of kitchen equipment is on the whitelist of topics for the site.
@rumtscho - Maintenance perhaps, I'm not sure how we can help with something damaged by mis-use. Answer added with KitchenAid's instructions.
From the KitchenAid instructions…
Is the KitchenAid® Spiralizer with Peel, Core and Slice attachment dishwasher safe?
The accessories (Fine Spiralizing Blade, Medium Spiralizing Blade, Large Core Slicing Blade, Small Core Slicing Blade, Peeling Blade) are dishwasher safe, top rack only. All blades are stainless steel. Clean the Spiralizer attachment main body by hand only. Wash with a soft, damp cloth. Dry thoroughly with a soft dry cloth. Do not wash in the dishwasher. Do not immerse in water.
Or from their web version - How to Clean the KitchenAid Spiralizer Attachment and Accessories
IMPORTANT: To avoid damage, never wash or immerse the main body of the
Spiralizer attachment in water or place in the dishwasher. The
removable blades and accessories are dishwasher safe, top rack only.
After using the Spiralizer, remove all blades and accessories. Wash
the blades and accessory pieces by hand with a soft cloth, in warm,
sudsy water; or, wash in the top rack of the dishwasher.
Clean the main body of the Spiralizer attachment by hand only. Wash
with a soft, damp cloth. Dry thoroughly with a soft dry cloth. Do not
wash in the dishwasher. Do not immerse in water.
You'd have to contact them & see if they might cover it under warranty.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.761350
| 2021-03-05T19:19:40 |
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|
114821
|
Substitute clarified butter with sunflower spread
Background
I am making a sweet recipe of Baklava, which calls on ghee or clarified butter.
So the butter substitute would be used to paint on the layers of filo pastry before baking.
My problem
When reading the ingredients list I instinctively substituted butter for sunflower spread as an acceptable dairy free alternative, not realising the process I would have to expose it to.
Question
Now given what is the desired outcome of clarified butter, I’m assuming this wouldn’t work by using sunflower spread? .. Or would it?
If not, any suggestions to how I can get around this mess without butter?
The instructions I have for making clarified butter
Melt the 1 1/2 cups (340g/ 12oz) butter slowly over medium low heat until the milk solids have separated from the butterfat. and collected on the bottom of the saucepan. Remove the pan from heat, let the butter settle for 10 minutes, then carefully skim the foam from the surface with a spoon. Slowly pour the clear butterfat into a bowl, leaving all the milk solids behind in the saucepan. You should end up with about 1 1/8 cup (255g/ 9oz) clarified butter.
Any thoughts, suggestions or workarounds much appreciated!
I'm making baklava, so the butter substitute would be used to paint on the layers of filo pastry before baking.
The clarifying process of the butter is irrelevant here, what is relevant is the recipe in which you will be using the fat.
Baklava is absolutely forgiving. Use any fat you want - butter, liquid oil, or a spread. I have made it and eaten it with all kinds of fat, it works. The only thing to keep in mind is flavor, you don't want to use some kind of highly flavored oil that doesn't fit the taste profile. Use either a low-flavor fat or a nut oil, especially one that matches the nuts in the baklava itself (typically walnuts) and all will be good.
"Spreads" are not an effective substitute for clarified butter for filo pastry, because they contain water and emulsifiers. The purpose of the clarified butter in filo pastry is to keep the layers separate, and water-containing spreads will encourage the layers to stick together. If you don't want to use butter, substitute vegetable shortening, like Crisco.
Simon.
Which recipe are you trying to make?
Keep in mind that sunflower spread is an emulsified product, so it should give a much denser structure to the final product if used as a replacement for clarified butter.
I would recommend trying out two recipes, one with sunflower spread and another with clarified butter, that way you can see for yourself which one worked out the best for your intent.
I'm making baklava, so the butter substitute would be used to paint on the layers of filo pastry before baking. Thanks
@Simon Could you add that information to your question to be sure everyone can see it and that it doesn't get deleted? Cheers
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.761524
| 2021-03-16T01:37:48 |
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|
116740
|
How to make vegan mayo with soy lechitin, oil and water without failing
I have soy lecithin with me. How do I blend this with water and oil to make vegan mayonnaise? I have tried a lot of times but every time I get a thin oily watery stuff.
The procedure is-
1)Mix 2 tbsp lecithin with 3 tbsp water.
2)Add the mixture with 1 tbsp oil and mix in the blender.
3)Repeat step 2 four times.
No matter how much oil I add, it doesn't work. When I use homemade soymilk instead of water+lecithin, it works.
When you add soy lecithin to your water-oil mixture and agitate it, it only helps to combine oil and water but does not give it the consistency of egg-based mayonnaise. It's way more fluid/watery. This video explains the chemical process behind this emulsion and gives you an idea of how this mix would look like and why. If you are really interested in the chemistry behind it.
To give your vegan mayo the body and stability of egg-based mayo when mixing it, you would need to add a base like vegetable or tofu when mixing soy lecithin, oil, and water.
The Soya milk works as it contains natural emulsifiers which bind the oil to make it nice and fluffy and mayo-like.
I found this blog post very helpful when making vegan mayo with a friend for the first time. The eggplant really does the trick!
Hi Hannah, I was rather confused by your first sentence, because at first I parsed it as trying to explain a difference between adding the lecithin "before emulsifying" and "after emulsifying" (which wouldn't happen anyway). I edited it to prevent others falling into the same language trap, I hope I was able to convey your meaning well.
@Hannah I added boiled potatoes in the watery goop that I had got with some more lecithin. The result was great mayo, but it is unstable. As soon as I remove it from the blender, it starts getting thin and loses its mayo feel. After an hour, there is a layer of oil and blended potato separated. How do I fix this so atleast I can have the stability for atleast like 15 minutes so I can eat it thick?
@Sam oh the lecithin should in theory avoid that the oil and water separate again. When exactly did you add the lecithin? Did you blend it all together at once?
I had mixed it with water then added it to the blender with some oil. Then added more oil gradually. After 1 day, I blended the potatoes with this mix then added some lechitin directly in the resultant thick mix then blended again.
I would try to create first a base using the lecithin before emulsifying. Therefore I would blend water or lemon juice and if you like mustard and garlic and the chosen vegetable together with the lecithin. After this has been set, you pour oil on top and allow it to settle for 15 seconds. Then you blend the oil into your base.
This should hopefully help the emulsion to last longer.
Reblending should always help troubleshooting your current mix, to get the mayo consistency back.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.761754
| 2021-08-08T11:40:21 |
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|
115464
|
Can a food contain 'extra' sodium?
I have always heard how food companies deliberately add 'extra' sodium to make foodstuffs like fried snacks and instant noodles addictive. But my question is, if I were to make the same food at home, won't I add an equivalent amount of sodium to get that taste? Or is some of the sodium content somehow 'hidden' in the food industries' products?
I get that flavour enhancers like supersalt and MSG have sodium in it. But doesn't the addition of those in packaged foodstuffs compensate for some of the salt that would otherwise be added?
Update: I am talking about extra sodium being added without an effect on taste, or it being added in a way that we get a greater 'kick' from the food, rather than the sodium being hidden in some way.
I think you're starting from a misconception. No-one "adds sodium to make foods addictive".
I think you've misunderstood people talking about sodium; I would expect they are generally just talking about table salt, NaCl.
Addressing your question about quantity, it's very common that when cooking, people judge ingredients by eye and by their expectation of what a normal quantity would be, so use much less salt than a restaurant or commercial preparation. (Something similar is true of butter.) Commercial ice cream, for example, will contain salt, but home ice cream makers are unlikely to include much if any.
If you want to think of that as 'hiding' sodium in products, I suppose that's reasonable, but it's not being done through mystery sodium compounds you're not aware of.
The answer is "no", but probably not for the reasons you imagined it.
The most widespread mental model on taste is what I would all "analytical": salt ions hit the receptors on your tongue, your brain notices the signal and you say to yourself, "this tastes salty", and this is taste.
I have the impression that the above model is the one most widespread in contemporary Western culture, but it does not actually explain well the realities of taste perception. This is why modern books on the physiology and psychology of taste usually apply a model more congruent with gestalt psychology: when you taste the food, your brain scrambles all signals coming from all sources at once, and the resulting internal experience is the taste. It is unique to the food you are eating, and trying to divide it up is meaningless.
I understand your question, with the update, to state that eating food with sodium and thinking "salty" is based on an implicit "normal" amount of sodium, and asking if adding more sodium will also cause our flavor experience to be changed without us being able to say that it is due to salt.
If you use the first model (which I don't recommend, since it describes reality poorly), it is possible to speak of "flavor enhancers" in the sense of this question. Remember, under this model, aspects of the taste experience which are consciously matched 1:1 to a chemical interaction on the tongue are the norm, and anything else shouldn't exist, or is at least a phenomenon requiring special explanation. This would match your description of "hidden" taste, which sounds a lot like the concept of salt "enhancing" taste, without your consciousness saying "this tastes so-and-so because of salt".
Under this first model, the opposite of your premise occurs. If you don't notice the effects of salt on a food, this is usually the food contains less salt than the amount that becomes salient. You might not recognize the salt in a slice of bread, but you will sure notice that brined herring is salty. This means that the flavor enhancing effect only happens when the food contains small amounts of salt, not large ones. Thus it is not "extra" salt on top of the salt you notice is there. If they were to add extra salt to salty food, you will still notice the salt, and it won't be hidden.
Under the second model, the question becomes meaningless. Since in this model, anything in your food is a contributor to the unique whole experience of taste, being an "enhancer" is the norm for all things in the food. A food containing so much salt that you also makes you recognize its contribution and say "oh, this is salty" is something that happens occasionally, and is possibly more an artefact of how we have learned to think of food (a normal person has learned to associate a taste with a particular profile with salt, while a wine taster has also learned to associate a different flavor profile with berries and notice when it is present or absent in wine). The contribution of recognized and unrecognized aspects to the whole of taste is not qualitatively different, and the attributions we make are not necessarily a true description of what is going on chemically on the tongue. So, declaring part of the taste a consequence of "normal" salt and another part the consequence of "extra" makes no sense. Since the concept of "extra" salt is meaningless, it obviously cannot be found in food, be it from industrial sources or otherwise.
I too think you have mis-understood what happens when the sodium is declared on the product nutritional information.
To get the sodium content (and other contents too), the food-stuff undergoes a chemical assay that measures the quantity of whatever they are looking for. This will be done in an analytical laboratory using specialist equipment that can measure very accurately the components in the food. I found a technical abstract comparing a few different methods here, which indicates that the methods of choice are one of the variants of mass-spectrometry (MS, how a molecule flies under an ionizing field), spectrophotometry (how much light absorbed by a substance (in this case the sodium which has been ionized by a flame)) or an ion-selective electrode (electrical potential of the ion in solution).
In theory you could add up the sodium content of the components of the food and work out the amount of sodium that is there, however this would be inaccurate because foodstuffs often contain sodium by themselves, without the addition of extra salt containing substances. A fine example of this is the seaweed Nori (the one used around sushi rolls) has about 48 milligrams of sodium per 100 grams naturally, but a seasoned nori can have up to about 2300 mg sodium/100g.
Because of the assays there is no "hiding" of the sodium content in the ingredients, all of the sodium that is there is measured in the assays, no matter if it comes naturally in the food, or is added in the form of sodium chloride, MSG etc.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.762001
| 2021-04-30T06:37:40 |
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|
108326
|
Deep Saute Pan vs Stockpot
I'm considering some new cookware and some sites have recommended I get a deep saute pan and a stock pot.
But from looking at All Clad's choices for the stockpot and the deep saute pan, these seem very similar, except the pan has a long handle and the pot does not.
Is there a functional difference?
What do you currently own in terms of pots?
A big 8 quart pot with a strainer
I would go with deep saute, though there are more shallow versions. Mine has maybe a 3" side. I use it for risotto, for example.
From what I can see from the links, they are the same pans, same size, same construction .. different handles
There is no functional difference, just a matter of preference. Pots are pots, in this case. Same material and essentially the same size.
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|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.762868
| 2020-05-12T21:45:10 |
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|
116994
|
How is truffle salt supposed to be used?
I have recently been gifted some truffle salt flakes "5% Australian Grown Perigord (Tuber melanosporum) Truffle".
I'm not used to using truffle in my cooking, so I'm not sure what to expect.
I'm finding that when I open the container, I can certainly smell something different to just salt (I imagine this is from the truffle). However, I have tried seasoning some scrambled eggs with it (made with just eggs and unsalted butter), and I cannot taste any difference to just using plain table salt.
Are there better uses for this salt where the flavour would be tasteable? Could it be that the amount of salt necessary to make the dish salty, is not enough for there to be more than a trace amount of truffle?
Truffle salt is more a gimmick (of hostess gift) than something that is really useful.
Use it as a finishing salt.
I'd sprinkle it over rice or potato purée or roasted, or even boiled vegetables.
I would not use it for cooking; the truffle flavor will disapear.
I add a small amount to Mac & cheese before throwing it in the oven to bake and it's fantastic - at least in that usage it seems not to lose flavor.
It's great on popcorn.
I regularly use truffle salt in scrambled eggs, and it can be sublime! However, you have to be aware that the truffle aroma is rather volatile. The one we had lost its flavour completely after about 12 months. (And this also explains what Max points out - it should be added just before serving, or it will evaporate.)
There is also a huge range of prices/qualities. I tried a different brand, and it was just salt with some indistinct black pieces thrown in. Maybe you got unlucky?
If you're after that punchy truffle flavour, you're better off with truffle oil. (Yes, it's completely fake, but if you use it in something cooked, it's definitely 'good enough'. It won't taste like proper Piedmontese white truffle, but it won't taste bad either. And it's orders of magnitude cheaper.)
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.762983
| 2021-08-28T01:52:45 |
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|
108949
|
How to clean up after kneading dough?
I've been making my first steps in baking recently. I usually knead the dough in the same large bowl I mix the dough in to minimize the mess but it's still a pain to wash the bowl and any sponge I use for it gets ruined afterwards.
Any advice on how to make washing off dough?
like any other bowl or dish.
When I'm finished kneading, the "sticks to everything" phase is over and the dough normally sticks to itself and leaves an almost clean bowl/tray and hands. Are you sure kneading (and resting) time and your recipe are OK (different flours need different amounts of liquid)?
Kneading in a bowl is time-consuming and doesn't give as good a result as kneading on a flat surface, however I'll concentrate on cleaning.
First, don't let things dry out, it's much easier to clean when things are moist, if you do let it dry out moisten it and let it soften before you try and clean it. Use cold water as hot water makes starches and proteins stick a lot more. Next, invest in a curved dough scraper, and use it to scrape out the dough scraps from the bowl into the garbage before you clean it. A curved plastic one works best as it has a bit of flex, although in a pinch you can use a big metal spoon. I scrape by bowl pretty much clean before I put it into the sink. Use the flat of the scraper to clear most of the dough and flour from your countertop, then spray down with water, let it soak for a few minutes, then scrape again. Once you have it scraped well sponge it down.
...and, I find cold water works better than hot.
Good point @moscafj, I've edited to include that.
+1 for the scraper. I use my countertop to knead, scrapey scrapey with the scraper afterwards and it's very easy cleanup.
Alternatively (with respect to @GdD's answer), let it dry out completely. Totally dry dough doesn't stick all that well to many surfaces (glass, plastic, non-stick). It then chips/scrapes off quite easily. If I get it on my oak worktops and don't notice immediately, that's what I do, scraping with a plastic scraper or a butter knife, even a fingernail on the last bits; the same approach works on my stand mixer bowl and dough hook. With some containers you may need to soak a few stubborn bits especially if they're caught in corners, but oiled wood doesn't like that.
If you are clearing up wet, very wet is the way to go, and a brush clogs less than a sponge.
I hand-work my dough either on a pastry mat or if that's dirty non-stick sheet (which isn't non-stick against dough unless well-floured, but cleans easily). These are both fairly easy to wash up.
This is the method that I use. Even for 'no knead breads' that are quite wet, I just let the container dry out, and then just knock it around some and pour the dried flakes out.
Amazed nobody else has given the easiest answer, which is to soak it in warm soapy water for a while (at least a few minutes, up to an hour) before scrubbing it out. It makes everything soft and partially dissolved and it just wipes away.
For handwashing: Use a dishwand instead of a sponge (the dough won't stick to the plastic bristles). Use warm rather than hot water, to avoid 'cooking' the starch onto things - but no need to use cold water.
Alternatively: Scrape as much of the dough as you can into the bin with a plastic spatula. Then put it the bowl in the dishwasher.
and any sponge I use for it gets ruined afterwards
I had the same problem until I started to use a brush like this one
(courtesy of Ikea https://www.ikea.com/fr/fr/p/rinnig-brosse-a-vaisselle-vert-90407811/)
It really makes a difference: cleaning the brush is much easier, including greasy/oily substances (in addition to sticky substances like dough in your case)
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.763168
| 2020-06-09T11:32:14 |
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|
80805
|
Butter spatters more than others
I usually use one kind of unsalted butter from the grocery store but my wife bought another brand for no known reason. I heated a tablespoon in a pan today and noticed it spattered far more than my usual brand which, to me, indicates more water content in the butter. Agreed? (EDIT: Yes it's true.)
Which leads to my question, what does that say about the quality of the butter if anything?
Both companies are well known brands with good reputations.
related: http://cooking.stackexchange.com/q/75282/1672 (doesn't seriously discuss comparison between brands though, I don't think)
@Jefromi I searched for "spatter" so I guess that's why I didn't see that.
Well, it seems you answered your own question, though you then expand this question of fat content to "quality."
"Quality" of butter is subjective. It depends a lot on application. Higher fat does not necessarily mean better flavor or better performance (particularly as an ingredients in things like baking). See, for example, this article, which discusses the ranking of butter in a number of applications. Fat content varied from 80% to about 86%, but that wasn't highly correlated with superior results. The tasters' opinions there came down in favor of the lower-fat butter for applications like pound cake (where they claimed more steam from the higher-moisture content added to lift) and buerre blanc (where they claimed the excess fat unbalanced the flavors of the sauce).
But I think this is probably more evidence that American recipes are likely calibrated to assume butters on the lower edge of spectrum, around the legal minimum of 80% butterfat content.
Anyhow, my personal experience is that processing matters a lot more than butterfat content. In particular, I generally taste a strong difference between cultured vs. "sweet cream" butters. And salt content can make a huge difference. But another thing that came up is storage/wrapping, as fat tends to absorb odors and other flavors, as mentioned in the above article and in a Cook's Illustrated review article that also ranked butters in various applications. I find it interesting that this article is available on the Vermont Creamery website, which makes a big point of how it has the "highest butterfat content you can obtain when making butter" of 86%; even they are posting an article whose title is basically that butterfat may not matter as much as other factors.
(By the way, I'd personally disagree with the CI characterization of cultured butters in general as having "artificial, margarine-like" flavors. But everyone has their own preferences, and I think American palates have shifted to expect "sweet cream" butter.)
I, for one, love the taste of cultured butter and find regular butter bland. But I've never used cultured butter in baking. Have you and if so, are some recipes better or worse using it?
@Jude - given the price of good cultured butter, I mostly have used it as a spread. I have occasionally tried it out in baking, and the only place I noticed a difference was in croissants. But I don't know whether it was the "cultured" aspect of the butter, the higher butterfat content, or some other aspect that actually made them stand out. I once made a pound cake with expensive cultured butter, and frankly didn't notice much of a difference. I'd read the linked articles above, since they clearly did a lot more experimentation here than I have with baking.
Is 6% (1/2 a tablespoon in a whole stick of butter) really noticeable?
@RonJohn - As I noted in the answer above, it likely depends on the application. The highest moisture content in my first link was 17.78% (for a butter that was 81% fat), while the lowest moisture content was 12.59% (for a butter that was 86% fat). That may be seem like a small difference in fat, but it's actually a 40+% increase in moisture content (17.78/12.59 = 1.41). Yes, that can make a difference in splattering or in applications where you depend on moisture in butter to evaporate for lift, etc.
More splattering means higher water content. Higher water content means reduced fat which means reduced flavor.
NY Times article:
Chefs like the butter for its low water content and rich flavor.
Instead of being 80 percent fat, the minimum required by the
Government since 1923, Plugra is 82 percent fat.
Related Washington Post article
My spattering butter was Oberweiss. My regular butter for frying is Land O'Lakes.
You should be able to judge this from the nutrition facts, although if it's a small difference 80 vs 82% it might be smaller than the rounding for the serving size. I'd also be pretty surprised if that scale of difference were that noticeable in spattering: for, say, 4 tablespoons of butter that's the difference between 11g and 12g of water.
In Germany we can buy a thing called Butterschmalz, which has been treated to remove all but the fat.They usually claim around 99% butter fat, and it's great for cooking with.
@RedSonja in English clarified butter -- not far from a direct translation of geläuterte Butter (alternative name according to wikipedia) if my German doesn't let me down.
I agree that the water content of the butter is responsible for the excessive spattering, bubbling and spitting of hot butter. Store brand at Walmart is very good; Ralphs Kroger brand is awful! I do a LOT of butter frying in my cast iron skillets: pre-boiled potatoes, onions, eggs, Great Northern Beans, even sauerkraut, so good frying butter is important.
Unfortunately, store brands like that will be sourced from various dairies depending on region, so your experience based on a particular store won’t generalise to others.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.763505
| 2017-04-10T21:33:28 |
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|
34597
|
What is the difference between French and British cuts of beef?
What is the difference between French and British cuts of beef?
I am told they just butcher the animals dfferently. Certainly the cuts don't seem the same. For example is faux fillet really exactly the same as British sirloin and is entrecôte really the same as rib steak?
Here is a picture of British beef cuts.
The simplest way to see the difference is to compare the cut diagrams:
British
French
Images courtesy of Wikipedia - Cut of Beef
The main difference is in how certain areas are sub-divided. We can see that faux-filet is part of the British sirloin, and entrecote is partly forerib and partly sirloin.
Thank you. The top picture is missing fillet of beef it seems which is a British cut as well.
@marshall: Technically a fillet can be any boneless cut. I don't think that it is a British term, but in North America it generally refers to the tenderloin.
@Aaronet With reference to beef and cookery, I think in British English it is "[...]the ‘undercut’ of a sirloin or rump of beef[...]". Take for example 1747 H. Glasse Art of Cookery ii. 21 A Fillet of Beef..is the Inside of the Surloin: You must carefully cut it all out from the Bone..roll it up tight; tye it with a Packthread.
@marshall anytime that you're cutting around a bone, you are making a fillet.
Obviously, the french cows go to the gym more. The british one seems to be missing the shoulder altogether. Blade, or flatiron steak?
The fillet is in the same place as the French filet. Fillet is the British term for tenderloin. The British shoulder cut is called the blade.
@ElendilTheTall I didn't even try to answer this since I have no direct familiarity with either UK or FR practices.... but my research made it sound like the French tradition may cut meat differently even within the named regions? We almost need a photo-dictionary comparing corresponding cuts, but that would be a huge effort.
You pay for the beef, I'll compile the dictionary!
You can also see that British cows go to the left and French to the right, probably related to the driving direction in the respective countries.
Apart from the fact that French and British cuts are differently named, the hindquarters are cut at different angles, which is why British cuts tend to be a lot more tender and easy to carve than their French counterparts.
Someone commented that 'Fillet doesn't exist in British cuts'? As someone (literally) born & brought up in a butcher's shop, I've never heard such utter nonsense.
I read somewhere that the British cut beef into about 40 cuts and the French into 200+ cuts so it seems the French have identified taste and texture difference not visible or unimportant to the UK/USA eyes/mouth or just that UK butchers don't think customers can tell. Comparing a butchers shop in France to one in UK or US is eye opening. The attention to detail, the use of fat strips, the careful cutting shows clearly that French butchers are superior. Having said that the meat is not always so. I got a rib roast in France and it was tough like leather, I was told later not aged at all.
The real difference is that the French feeding of their bovine for cuisine is very different than the British or American
Fillet and faux fillet, are the cuts that are not found in a normal Angus or Angus type of Bulls. It is due to their feeding
The British and/or American's prefer a layer of fat, whereas the French in their fillet have none. For example, le fillet American is scraped fillet with a blunt knife. There are other examples of the difference but this one it most obvious. Pedantically, fillet does not exist in English/American Cuts
Two things
1.The French diagram seemsfar more detailed than the English one, which lacks several cuts
2. Meat cuts are regional in both countries, but I think more in the UK
The obvious examples have already been mentioned, fillet steak is definitely an English cut,the eye of the loin. French paleron = feather or blade (regional names) Skirt is not shown (it is related to onglet). Neck is not a cut commonly sold in London, I'm not even sure what I'd ask for, I suspect it goes into anonymous stewing steak and mince
|
Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.763967
| 2013-06-09T07:33:25 |
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|
39511
|
How to clean a wooden cauldron lid?
I bought this the other day for making shabu shabu (샤부샤부) as well as for camping. The pot itself is made of cast iron which I know how to clean, but the lid is made of wood. The lid doesn't get very dirty during use - but there are some splatters, etc - I'm wondering if I should wipe this down with oil or just water? I would use oil, but I'm concerned that this will inhibit the wood's ability to swell when placed over steaming liquid.
Beautiful. If it were mine it would usually get cleaned with a quick wipe with a slightly damp paper towel. On the rare occasions that it needed it, it would get sponged with soapy water, rinsed, and lightly oiled as it dried.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.764352
| 2013-11-17T10:58:22 |
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|
37801
|
How do I choose frozen fish so that it doesn't release so much water?
I bought a package of frozen, individually wrapped, vacuum-sealed pacific cod fillets (about 150-200 grams each) from what I thought was a reputable brand (and not the lowest price) in my nearest supermarket, and attempted to pan-fry it. I defrosted it by running cold water in the sink as advised in this answer (it took about 15 minutes). When I opened the package, a large amount of water had separated from the fish. I carefully dried the fillet with towel paper, coated it with flour and put it in a hot pan over maximal heat as explained in this other question. Despite my efforts and the hot pan, the fish immediately started releasing even more water, dissolving the flour and turning into a small 75-100 grams of boiled, chewy fish fillet instead of a nice fried, tender one.
So I am looking for advice on how to properly choose frozen fish in the first place. I know that it should be properly vacuum-sealed and from a reputable source (whatever that means). But even then, some frozen fishes will loose a lot of water (it was obviously the case here). What qualities should I look for when buying it? Can I tell by the fish aspect or something else if it's good or not? Are some species better than others?
Have you considered that maybe 15 minutes might not have been sufficient time and you were still left with some ice crystals that turned into water when they hit the pan?
Is it possible to place it in the toaster on warm (lowest heat) for an hour and let all the water run off into a pan. I do that to salmon to dry it out, without excreting the oil in the fish. Salmon is a firmer fish than cod.
@Charlotte'scook the fish was soft on touch, but you're right there could have been some ice still, I can't really tell.
As far as I am aware, you cannot recognize this in advance.
What you describe is due to very damaged cell structure in the fish. The "water" are the fluids contained in and around the fish cells, which make the filets juicy. They flow out when the cell walls in the fish rupture.
The reason for rupturing is that the fluids are water-based, and water expands in the 0 to -4 Celsius range. When meat or fish is flash-frozen, it goes very quickly to under -4, and in the small time it spends in the problem range, the cell walls withstand the pressure from the expanding ice crystals. When it is frozen in a "slow" process, the cell walls rupture. Or, if it was flash-frozen, but sometime during storage it spend long periods above -4, it will also have this problem.
There is no way for you to recognize whether a piece of frozen fish or meat in the supermarket was flash-frozen or not. So sorry, but you have to rely on luck, and maybe try to find if there is a correlation between certain brands and quality by buying them repeatedly.
This is the exact reason why planning in advance and buying fish as fresh as possible, preferably the day before, should be the way to go about having a good fish meal. If anyone has ever wondered why freezing basil makes it go black and wet then it's the same as this answer.
Yes it does, frozen seafood is typically soaked in a Sodium Tripolyphosphate bath so it holds water weight. This is why a milky white liquid leaches out when you cook it. It has nothing to do with cells being broken. This is why sushi grade fish maintains its texture, its flash frozen. The more you know...
Hi Steve! Welcome to Seasoned Advice. You start your answer with "Yes it does..." but I don't see where there is a yes/no question in the OP. Could you maybe help clarify that bit? The question here is how to find fish that don't release so much water--it seems like your answer is to use sushi grade fish?
I thaw the fish and then place it between two dish towels and put a very, and I mean very heavy weight on them. It really helps, but alas the folks are right. They cheat you with water weight and chemicals generally. But, I am landlocked and cannot get fresh fish so I must as I must. Good luck.
Fish fillets steaks or whole fish should NOT contain ANY water at all. I have caught, filleted and processed hundreds of pounds of fish of a variety of species, Halibut, salmon, mah mahi, yelowfiun tuna, bonito, mackerel, blue fish, stripers, calico bass, trout and many more and fish flesh is not water logged. The flesh of fish is not water logged like what you unfortunately are forced to get from the supermarket if you can't catch your own. The fish you are buying is filleted and then soaked in water to absorb the water and add weight to the purchase. You and everyone else buying fish like this are being cheated.
All you can do is try and let it drip dry in a collander slowly for a few hours and then put the fillets between paper towels until the water is absorbed.
A fish, like any living organism, is mostly water (well, cell plasma) on the inside. Sure, if you prepare it fresh and never freeze it, less of it will flow into the pan. This doesn't mean that anybody soaked the filets in the supermarket.
|
Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.764467
| 2013-10-21T20:06:16 |
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|
115029
|
Is there such a thing as a dish being bland from too many flavors?
My girlfriend has asked for my opinion on a few dishes that she has been experimenting with, and not being particularly well-versed in the language used to discuss food, I have been having trouble expressing my opinion on two specific dishes (namely, a stew using ground beef and a Thai curry with chicken).
I have eaten several different versions of both dishes over several months, so I have developed a pretty good sense of which versions of them I like the best. We have also tried similar dishes from local restaurants in order to have a common reference point. Generally, I think that the dishes taste fine, but sometimes I feel that they become "bland" (for lack of a better word) from too many spices.
What I mean is that sometimes when she prepares them she will use only a few specific spices or none at all and more fresh ingredients. To me, these versions taste the best. They have strong, distinct flavors, and I think that they taste more like the restaurant dishes that we've compared them to. However, she usually finds these versions under-seasoned, so she also experiments with adding lots of different spices. When she does this, she still isn't happy with the result but she says that the dishes taste more "complete" or more "harmonious" or just generally better. On the other hand, I think that these versions taste same-y or bland, which she doesn't understand since there are objectively more flavors in the dish. I have tried to describe it like the flavor equivalent of that color of brown you get when you mix all the paints together or if an orchestra just played all the instruments at once without regard to the timing.
To me, these versions sort of feel like filling in all the nooks and crannies of the flavor landscape to make the experience boring and flat. She says that I just don't understand flavor and that that's not a thing that happens. She says that adding more flavors complement and round-out the taste.
I am nowhere near as knowledgeable about food words as my girlfriend, and she also has a much more sensitive and discerning palate than I do. So it may be possible that I am just a bad food critic, but I would really like to understand my experience better and hopefully communicate it better to my girlfriend. My question is this: Is there such a thing as "the flavor equivalent of the color brown" in the sense that too many different flavors can make food sort of taste bland? If so, is there a technical way to describe that sensation?
Since this does not answer the question, I figured it was suitable for comments (sorry if that is not correct on this site, I'm having trouble finding specific rules). My girlfriend and I sometimes encounter this same issue - we found a way to reconcile the differences between our two preferred dishes. By reserving some of all of the brighter, fresher ingredients, and garnishing each person's dish with those ingredients to their own preferences, you can almost make the two completely separate dishes. One has a a more muddled outcome, and the more garnished dish highlights the fresh ingredients
It's extremely common that newer cooks find a recipe to be "bland" and attempt to fix the blandness by adding spices. The problem is almost always a lack of salt. This is especially true in the case of dishes like curries, soups, and stews. Even a plain piece of cucumber won't taste bland with a dash of salt. Encourage your girlfriend to keep a spoon handy to taste the soup/curry as it's nearing completion and add salt until it is no longer bland. Once it's properly "seasoned", which is how we refer to properly salted food, she can experiment with adding flavor via spice.
from what I remember the la riviera episode of the UK version of kitchen nightmares centers pretty heavily on the idea of "too many flavors". not necessarily all that informative but maybe still worth a watch
@ZaelinGoodman Definitely agree with keeping some ingredients back for finishing, +1. Particularly with something like a curry, the flavour profile of a squeeze of lime juice that's done over the top of a bowl just before serving is a mile away from adding some lime juice at the start of cooking where it loses a lot of its brightness. & there are plenty of ingredients that would fall into that category — particularly anything 'aromatic' or added for texture: fresh leafy herbs (coriander), finely sliced chilli, crispy onions, toasted almond flakes, etc.
As a follow-up to @Banjoe 's comment let me just recommend this video (for your girlfriend): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9L-tJxPTGY (and the rest of the series). Just this one video did wonders for me when I started cooking more seriously recently. And, spoiler alert, he does discuss the importance of the right amount of salt!
Lots and none at all…
If the "too many" flavours cancel each other, the dish might contain all the world's greatest flavours and still average itself out as bland.
Did you have something specific in mind?
With your longer description, I can understand where you are coming from and why you don't like this version of the dishes (and also why somebody else might prefer them). But the term "bland" you chose is unfortunate, and is predestined to create misunderstandings.
"Bland" is a word with a rather well-circumscribed meaning, and means that there is an absence of taste and flavor. To use your color analogy, "bland" would be applied most directly to something that is ecru colored, and, less fitting but still understood, to something that has its own color tone but so little pigment that it is still nearly white. For food, imagine maybe a pudding made with starch and water, nothing else, that would be a quintessential experience of bland food.
The experience you describe doesn't have a unique term, and the descriptive ones I can think of are non-technical. The most specific one I can come up with is "mingled flavors", although this one doesn't strongly evoke that the speaker disapproves of the extent of mingling. You can choose whatever you like and best reflects your own subjective experience. Some examples would be to call it "conflicting", "chaotic" or "overwhelming" taste combinations. Or, if you prefer to continue the metaphors from other senses, you can use "cacaphonous taste" or, more diplomatically, "lack of contrast".
I would also like to mention that your experience here does not validate hers, she is also just as right as you are, and finding a term will not lead to an agreement between you as to what the perfect dish should be. Every one of you has a set point for enjoyable taste, expects to find it in the dish, and is dissatisfied when the dish misses that point. What overwhelms your experience is well-rounded for her, and what is nicely focused to you is boringly one-dimensional for her. In keeping with your color comparison, insisting that only one of the two positions is "right" would be like insisting that painting like Franz Marc is "right" and painting like Caspar David Friedrich is "wrong", or the other way round.
After a discussion with my girlfriend, she found the expression "lack of contrast" very helpful and explanatory. I appreciate you detailed answer, and personally, I found it very clear and helpful.
+100 for "I would also like to mention that your experience here does not validate hers, she is also just as right as you are, and finding a term will not lead to an agreement between you as to what the perfect dish should be". My wife and I have different tastes in food with significant common ground. And that's ok. But clearing up the miscommunication is a good idea. :)
I think the description you're looking for is what is often described as "muddy flavors" or "fighting flavors" or "muddled flavors" (though the latter is also a term used for a specific technique, so searching the internet will give lots of results for that).
This doesn't mean that it tastes like a mix of dirt & water--but rather that the flavors are no longer distinct, and possibly fighting with each other.
When you create recipes, the goal is to get all the individual pieces to come together to "sing" like a harmonious chorus. Each element comes together to do it's individual small role so that when it comes together it create a beautiful song. If you use too many strong flavors, they fight with each other--like trying to build a choral group out of egotistical soloists who all want to shine as the center of attention.
That "group of egotistical soloists," in food, creates "fighting" or "muddy" flavors.
"Confused" is a word often used to describe this on the show Masterchef (the British version; the others are about egotism and not cookery, so don't bother with them). Too many flavours fighting for dominance.
Thank you for this answer! I think the term is quite descriptive, and I'll be certain to keep it in mind.
This is why a cheeseburger might taste good but a blended cheeseburger tastes like crap.
@DKNguyen That's more of a texture-wise phenomenon, no? :)
@AnastasiaZendaya Difficult to say. I mean, it's not like I after I finish chewing a bite I let it sit in my mouth a bit to savor the flavour. I have to eat a lot of blended food of all kinds though and no matter how good it is whole it always tastes like crap blended because I can't tell what anything is. It's a homogenous mix.
I like the comparison to 'the colour brown' & yes, I would agree this is quite possible.
To try stick with this allusion let's consider a generic takeaway ['indian'] curry.
A poor one is definitely 'brown'. I'm with you there. It has no highs & no lows, it's all just a generic 'curry flavour'.
Contrastingly, a good one has depths & highlights.
It has a deep red, an undercurrent of dark, long-cooked flavours. Difficult to tell apart perhaps, but a depth that the rest of the flavours need to sit on.
Then some later additions - a little added garam masala, giving some quick-cooked higher tones, in 'orange'.
Above that, some highlights, occasional stronger tones of 'green'. Maybe a sliver of ginger added just before serving, a flash of fresh chilli, a cardamom you find as a surprise half-way through.
Then above that, the brilliant 'white' of fresh coriander [cilantro], tomato, a squeeze of lime, a few ajwan seeds sprinkled over, a bright side-salad, perhaps also with lemon or lime & fresh chilli.
One other way to ensure these separations of flavour is to make sure all your spices are actually new [I won't say 'fresh' because these are mainly dried] but supermarket spices do tend towards the bland, even when newly-purchased. Specialist grocers might be a whole different colour-palette. I swapped from generic supermarket to an online specialist a few years ago & the first thing I learned was to use less of everything, the flavours were so punchy in comparison.
The same with the fresh ingredients. Supermarket coriander tends to only be green in colour, & that's about all it adds to the food… some green colour. Good stockists sell coriander you can smell from down the street. Bright enough to make you blink ;)
I think these observations are quite insightful, and I'll pass on the ideas to my girlfriend.
Okay, take a curry with 10 different spices (each of which you are familiar with) for example.
Will you be able to identify each spice in the curry with just one spoonful? If there were only one spice, say pepper, it would be easy to identify. But with the 10-spiced curry, you will only be getting one tenth the amount of pepper, blended in with 9 times the amount of the pepper in different spices (assuming she used a set amount for spices combined).
So if your brain has a hard time identifying the ten flavors, how would you describe the taste of the curry? Every flavor you will be able identify in the mix will be muffled by every 9 other flavors!
It's not like your brain will automatically find another flavor with a name (aside from generic ones like spicy) to replace the mix, so yeah, I understand how you might find the curry bland in a certain manner, though it could be simply overwhelmed.
To be honest, I wasn't very aware of this until long ago when I saw a baking reality show. This one contestant made a cake with like 20 flavors; the judges weren't happy about that, and that almost caused him to lose that particular round.
Of course you can also go too far in the other direction....consider artificial flavors, which are often too simple/"flat"/"one note"... You will certainly get dinged for that, too.The difficulty is, like the OP is finding, that the Goldilocks zone between too simple and too complex is personal.
Thank you for this answer! My girlfriend and I discussed some of the issues you brought up here, and we came to the conclusion that she likely has a much more sensitive sense of taste than I do. As a result, she can taste the delicate highs and lows of complex flavor spectrums to a degree that I simply cannot. We think that - for her - one-tenth the flavor is plenty, but for me, it gets washed out.
Bringing up the idea of 10 different spices all "muddied" together, it sounds logical that the mixture might be unidentifiable, and somehow "cacophanous". But think about each individual spice and how many chemicals it may contain all by itself. Somehow our senses/brain (or whatever) identifies a mixture of chemicals as an individual item ("oh: ginger!", "hmmm, tastes like matzo ball soup mix", "... did you put root beer in this?", etc.). I can't see why we wouldn't recognize and like/dislike any combination (no matter how complex) of flavor components without perceiving it as "too muddled".
@LorelC. I have an amateur theory here - people seem to have different styles of trying to make sense of their perceptions. It goes in the same direction as people saying things like "I am more of a big picture kind of person" or "I am very detail-oriented". I have tried, for experimentation, to consciously "switch" my focus from detailed to all-at-once for a minute, and it is an uphill battle (but a worthwhile exercise). So, while learning to perceive the flavor "as a whole" is possible, if that's not what the OP's brain is doing by itself, it is cognitively difficult - and thus not...
... automatically perceived as enjoyable. Also, beyond a difference in focus style, there is a difference in the total capacity of (grouped) "objects" people can hold in short-term memory, then there is a difference in how they group (that changes as a side effect of experience) and also differences in sensitivity to flavor already on the taste bud level, with people tasting a different subset of the chemicals present. I am sure that what you are proposing is possible, my impression is that when it doesn't happen on its own, getting there is difficult and not immediately pleasant.
@LorelC. I agree with rumtscho♦. In Masterchef, there were such rounds where contestants would have to identify ingredients in some classic dishes. Nothing fancy in the dishes, but still pretty stressful!
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.764975
| 2021-03-30T17:26:55 |
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113969
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Egg free steamed raspberry pudding
This is an old recipe. Back in the 1940s to the 1970s, my mom used to make individual raspberry puddings steamed in her handleless cups. I can't recreate it.
I think it had baking soda and/or baking powder in it. I don't think it had eggs. It was somewhat grayish in color It did not have a golden top or texture and taste akin to a sponge pudding as is true with every raspberry steamed pudding I've seen or tried. I remember it had a slight baking powder/soda taste.
Has anyone had this and knows how to make it? My 80-year-old brother and I would love to make it. My budget is nearing its end for buying fresh raspberries in January.
Welcome Germaine! Can you share recipes that you have tried so far, and what isn't working about them? Unfortunately requesting a recipe for a dish is not on-topic (there might be multiple ways of doing it) but we can help refine what you have.
There are people who are going to try closing this as a ‘recipe’ request unless you specifically mention what you’ve tried and how it didn’t quite come out like you expected. But to try to actually help you with your actual question.... where did you grow up, and where was your mother’s family from? Did you mother tend to stick to old family recipes, exchange recipes with friends, or try new things from magazines? Did she ever mention anything about the history of it? (Like her mom used to make it for her, or or she loved it growing up, etc)
Hmm, non-golden top would imply that it was cooked in an improperly sealed steamer with a lid on - water drips onto the surface causing discolouration/pale colour. Also was it jam or fresh raspberries, most recipes I know for this use jam.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.766389
| 2021-01-26T20:08:59 |
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120657
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How do I soften home made Split Pea with crunchy Peas?
I got some Split Pea Soup from my Fiance's Nannie, who got it from a friend. The soup tasted ok, but it was like really chunky like the spoon stood up on it's own. So I added water and reheated it. The water didn't help the Peas were Still Crunchy Please Help What do I do?
Welcome to the site. Does this answer your question?
Does this answer your question? Split pea soup won't soften. Any way to soften the peas without burning?
...cook it more.
Really all there is to it - if the peas are not sufficiently cooked, they need more cooking. So re-heat and keep it re-heated (simmering) for as much as several hours, until the peas are no longer crunchy.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.766557
| 2022-05-21T18:50:45 |
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97515
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Bete Noir -- no dairy
I'd like to try this bete noir recipe, but it's for Passover. I'd like to make it parve (dairy free). I'm thinking about substituting butter with margarine (which seems pretty straightforward), and for the ganoche, whipping cream with almond milk (which feels iffier).
Any immediate thoughts on a better approach, or advice for using the almond milk, in particular??
UPDATE: I took the good advice to serve something else, and wait to do this recipe justice. I was ready -- even found some coconut milk with guar right in it, marketed as a cream substitute, but chickened out. Made it with whipping cream this week, and it was worth it-- though the ganache is just a thin layer on top of the cake, and I suspect the coconut w/ guar would have worked just fine.
You may want to read this very elaborate Q/A on coconut milk ganache and whipping.
The expression is properly spelt bête noire
: the beast being feminine and all, and the chapeau being obligatory. :)
The key to a smooth ganache is fat - add too much water and you will end up with a “grainy” product. There are even recipes that use butter instead of cream (full or partial substitution), and while that’s probably a heart attack on a spoon, the texture is excellent. Almond milk is at least as “watery” as regular cows milk, so yes, that’s a questionable substitute without further changes.
You can benefit from the recent vegan trend and either use full-fat coconut milk (if the flavor is to your liking) or buy a vegan cream substitute, just check what your local store has available. If you want to use almond milk, consider adding a butter substitute (solid vegetable fat?).
Margarine instead of butter in the crust won’t be an issue, alternatively, you may want to check vegetable shortening. We may have a few Q/As on that substitution on the site. And don’t forget to get dairy-free chocolate.
Wow-- thanks for the heads up on the almond milk!! This was a disappointment waiting to happen. The margarine is for the decadent chocolate non-ganache part, not crust, but it still looks right.
good point on the chocolate. After looking around near me a few years back, I found that Wegman's store brand chocolate chips are dairy free.
Most of the chocolate on the Kosher for Passover rack in Wegmans seem to be dairy free.
I have switched from coconut milk to coconut cream for curries. Cream is fattier. Look at can - some comes sweetened and some not.
Hmm....depending on the water-to-almond-solids ratio of the almond milk, it might never reach the whipped cream texture. I think you're better off with coconut cream.
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.766650
| 2019-04-16T19:15:04 |
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122995
|
How can I tell if a broth carton with a twist cap is sealed?
Many companies offer broth in a box carton with a twist-off cap. In the US, these are usually 32 oz cartons but may be other sizes as well. Twisting the cap breaks a foil seal underneath, allowing one to pour the stock. There is no way to remove the cap without breaking the foil seal, meaning there is no way to know if the foil seal was intact before it was broken as part of opening the carton. There may be some external signs that the seal is not intact or the product is otherwise not fresh (leaking, bulging, etc), but how can I tell that the broth inside is safe to use?
Larger cartons sometimes have a flip-open top and one must pull up the foil seal separately. Smaller containers are usually in cans. Neither have this problem.
Example container from Swanson:
Image taken from Campbell's website
In Australia, these types of boxes are also used for shelf-stable (prior to opening) juices/fruit drinks and long-life milk.
After several edits to incorporate suggestions from comments [now gone]
The thing to take away from this answer is that the seal itelf is not the primary indicator of tampering. Because there are many methods of exposing the seal, some of which will actually break the seal by the simple action of trying to check its integrity, then your indicator is the tamper-evident lid… not the seal itself.
In some designs…The lid when new is not fully closed [see above]. You must close it to puncture the foil seal using a 'blade' mechanism in the lid itself. This also breaks the plastic tamper-proof seal which is an integral part of the lid. There are variants on this design [see above] including ones that break the seal as you first unscrew the lid, but all have the tamper-evident lid & some mechanism to break the seal on first opening.
This plastic tamper-proof device is your evidence the seal may be compromised. No other evidence can be known at this point.
Even if someone just removed the lid, though they may not have broken the food seal, you could see they'd broken the plastic lid.
You don't have to check for pressure or any other signs of spoilage, just look at the tamper device on the lid. The carton re-seals perfectly with the lid fully tightened by the consumer after purchase, so pressure, leakage etc is not the true sign is has been tampered with, merely additional tell-tales.
The old method of having a separate pull-off seal underneath wasn't really liked by either consumer or manufacturer. For the consumer it meant a two-step process; those seals can be annoying if you don't have full mobility [& even if you do]. For the manufacturer, it meant they had to employ a secondary piece, manufactured & adhered separately; more room for error & more expensive.
The new design means the seal is part of the inner box; card, foil, plastic. All they need to do is leave a hole in the card before laminating the rest. The lid protects it before sale & contains the mechanism to puncture it before use.
Easier, cheaper, greener.
Here's one major manufacturer's version of this lid design, TetraPak - https://www.tetrapak.com/en-us/solutions/packaging/packaging-material/helicap--23
Tamper-proof seal, unbroken
If broken, the ring where those small gaps are will be separated from the rest of the lid & loose.
BTW, in the UK at least, even the flip-top containers now have this single 'open to puncture' mechanism. The flip top is a lever mechanism which itself penetrates the seal on first opening, then clips shut again. Except for bottled [as opposed to carton, UHT] milk, I think most of the old pull-top type seals are gone.
Great answer. I worry sometimes not about tampering per se, but that the foil is broken for some production issue, so the external cap+seal would be intact, that's what got me interested in the question.
Give it a slight squeeze. If it’s letting air out, you’ll be able to continuously squeeze until liquid comes out. If it is sealed it will resist further squeezing after only a slight squeeze.
Additionally, the seal is under a sealed plastic twist top, which is not actually in the “closed position” at the time of purchase. Hence, you need to break the outer plastic seal (which is itself a tamperproof design) of the cap and twist it closed to break the inner seal to open it initially. If the inner seal was already broken or compromised, even with the cap plastic seal intact, it would simply pour out of the container when you lift it up.
Another precaution is if you see a carton that seems overly full (or inflated), that to me is a sign that the contents have likely spoiled.
I don't know for sure but I think the internally sealed ones are built that way in the factory as one piece, with the lid piercing an internal wall of the container rather than having a separate hole to open. In this design I think there are typically 3 layers - outer cardboard, internal foil and innermost plastic. The lid rips open the foil and plastic layers.
I suspect that this makes manufacturing the carton easier and allows greater reliability of the packaging. With cartons where the lid doesn't pierce, and you need to peel off a seal below the lid adds an extra point of failure and possibly manufacturing complexity ...cost.
There is no way to tell whether the carton has been opened before you reach it, other than to inspect the lid and look for signs that it has been loosened. In cases where it has been opened, I would expect the contents to spoil within 24h at room temperature, which would be obvious by bulging or shrinking of the packaging (depending on what sort of bacteria contaminating and whether they metabolize to produce gas or not).
To prevent spoilage, these sorts of cartons often will contain no air in them when sealed. By opening the package you allow air to enter the carton - which will then cause spoilage over time.
Next time you go to open a carton, feel for the difference before and after opening the carton with how the liquid moves when sloshed or shaken. There is a distinct difference with and without the additional air!
From admittedly a sample of only one, [I only have one carton in the house right now which is unopened], there is air in the carton. It is presumably sterile [BB date is 9 months], but it is definitely present. I think to attempt to remove all air would mean more spillage, which would then require better contamination controls outside the carton area & some cleanup of each carton before finally packing to ship. I don't think this would be a practicable solution.
Interesting! I haven't ever handled an unopened carton with air, although admittedly I predominantly handle soy milk cartons. I wonder if that's a difference of preservatives etc. It would be interesting to know if the ones with air still feel different when unopened vs opened
@Tetsujin but how can you tell that air is "definitely present"? I am genuinely curious - in my mind distinguishing between air & vacuum would not be so easy. Or is the working assumption that a carton cannot withstand any vacuum, and therefore sploshing implies air presence?
If there was no air there would be no vacuum, the carton is simply not strong enough to support one.
I had a shake of a few cartons at the shops yesterday, some definitely have air in them. Not able to compare it before and after opening but I'm curious if there's a difference
What I do is I shake the bottle before opening it. After carefully opening it, if the underside of the cap is wet, the seal was broken.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.766906
| 2023-01-11T18:20:46 |
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|
103826
|
How much can I change a NY cheesecakes recipe?
My sister recently started making NY cheesecakes (Baked) according to an online recipe she found. I assisted her in doing so, and every time I mentioned any kind of change we could make in the recipe she refused to even think about that stating "you should be loyal to the recipe" and "don't make comments about things you don't know".
So I'm wondering: how much can I change a recipe for a different result?
Can I swap "petit beurre" biscuits with "digestive" biscuits?
Can I use any other kind of starch instead of corn starch?
In general, is it wrong to make drastic changes in a recipe?
P.S.: I am the kind of a person that tries different things to find the right way to do things, more of a trial and error kind but with the recent spike in the prices in my country and the economy we have I can't afford trying and failing no more, so I have to ask about everything beforehand, even the simplest things.
For the specific example of "petit beurre biscuits" vs. "digestive biscuits", a true New York style cheesecake doesn't have the faintest clue what either of those things are. Recipes will variously have graham crackers, Nilla wafers, no crust at all, or sometimes even a pre-baked shortbread crust, but a search for "digestive biscuits" in most New York grocery stores will come up totally blank. IOW, if the recipe you're using suggests "petit beurre biscuits" (whatever that means), it has already been translated/modified, so your sister is starting off on entirely the wrong foot.
@Marti yeah i get what you say , since we don't have access to those kind of biscuits here i wrote what we used as an example , and i think the petit beurre is kind of a french shortbread or something originally , we have it here manufactured locally, https://www.google.com/search?q=petit+beurre&oq=petit+beurre&aqs=chrome..69i57.229j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
Many beginners in the kitchen get advice along the lines of “you can play around with cooking, but baking recipes shouldn’t be changed or you risk failure” or something similar. This is only partially true.
Whenever you consider substitutions, you need to consider what the purpose of the given ingredient is. This will help in finding the answer to the “can I substitute” question. A few examples:
Corn starch thickens - potato starch will do the same, plain flour will usually work, but may affect the mouthfeel and flavor a bit.
Substituting one kind of dry biscuit for another will be no problem texture-wise, as the crumbs are bound together with the butter, but of course each kind will give a different flavor - and if you use a recipe that adds sugar to the crumbs you want to compensate the difference in sweetness between the chosen biscuits. Still, crumb crusts are quite forgiving.
Dairy is tricky - especially if it’s the main ingredient. Using a low-fat softer type instead of the rather firm “bricks” of cream cheese in US recipes can backfire badly. Here the different water content must be compensated, which means you need to adjust other binding ingredients. And the flavor will be different.
If in doubt, it’s always a good idea to check lots of recipes for the same dish. The common denominators should become clear as well as the range of variations.
It's important to note that even when substituting a product that "does the same thing" will likely require a different amount of that product, and if you're not experienced, then it may be nontrivial to guess what the appropriate changes in amount (and other ingredients - the "compensation" mentioned in this answer) should be to ensure proper proportions for the expected result. Properly substituting a key ingredient might require baking "the true recipe" once for comparison purposes followed by 2-3 iterations of "your variation" until you can get it just right.
These decisions you list are all more or less obvious for an experienced baker, but much less so for an inexperienced one (not to mention the quantity issue), which is precisely why this advice exists. So I don’t agree that the advice, given to beginners, is only “partially true”. In fact, it’s pretty good advice because as people learn what substitutes work they will automatically learn to strategically disregard the advice. A.k.a “rules can be broken when you understand why they exist”.
@KonradRudolph I think it took me a quarter century to dare to switch from given recipes to ratios in baking. And a whole world opened up. Just saying.
@Peteris I Will definitely cook the original recipe once at least anyway , just as i said we already did the recipe , in fact we baked it three times , once without the sour cream and twice with the sour cream.
Maybe not an answer.
I'd try to collect as much NY Cheesecake recipes as possible and see what are the common parts and what variations there are between them.
In one of your example, recipes I've looked at are quite liberal in what can be used as crust.
For example, this recipe suggests "...graham cracker, digestive biscuits, or vanilla wafer crumbs..."
in general is it wrong to make drastic changes in a recipe?
I would say yes, drastic change will change the recipe; especially, IMO, in baked goods like cakes and cheesecakes and stuff like that.
There is a general understanding that a NY cheesecake should be; and if you change the recipe and it results in something different, then it not a NY cheesecake anymore.
well i might have written it wrong , by drastic i don't mean to change 5 of the 7 ingredient , but rather changing one or two of them , but i do understand what you are saying , just for the sake of a couple more answers i won't choose yours for a day or two
+1 especially for the last paragraph. Also, I would add that if "don't make comments about things you don't know" was accurate and OP really does not have experience in NY cheesecake, it is probably too early to diverge from the recipe. It is fine to change things to your taste (even if you no longer can call it NY cheesecake or whatever) but it is next to impossible to predict results of a change i you don't know how the base recipe plays out. Add to this pat about "I can't afford trying and failing" and you have a firm no.
You mean if I substitute a tomato broth for a cream broth in my New England clam chowder it might not be New England clam chowder?
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.767516
| 2019-11-30T21:12:31 |
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|
108671
|
Using chocolate for caramel instead of butter
For caramel popcorn, what if we use a chocolate compound instead of butter for caramel. Even if it doesn't become caramel, can it be used for coating popcorn like caramel?
Please suggest me if there is any other cheaper way to make it like caramel by using chocolate (and oil if required).
are you wanting to do somethin like this https://www.thechunkychef.com/chocolate-covered-popcorn/ ?
If you mean you want to add the chocolate to the melted sugar instead of adding butter (and cream), my first thought is no. The sugar will be very hot, well above the burning point of the chocolate, and both texture and taste will be ruined.
@senschen : maybe you could stir in cocoa butter (or white chocolate), to cool it, and then stir in a really dark chocolate once the temperature's come down?
|
Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.768140
| 2020-05-28T04:25:19 |
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|
109805
|
How to make authentic black Russian bread?
I'm trying to re-create the authentic black Russian bread that was first mass produced during soviet times. Nowadays you can find it in any Russian market and many international supermarkets in the US.
The problem is most recipes I can find online either:
Use a lot of additives such as cacao powder and coffee to color the bread, which don't seem historically plausible
or
Don't achieve nearly the same dark shade as the pre-packaged store variants
Anecdotally, my dad claims that this bread was sold in the Soviet Union in his youth as the cheapest bread available, for those who couldn't afford bread made from finely milled wheat. At its initial inception it was mass produced by the state and supposedly didn't taste great (although it did have that dark black color). Considering it was the cheapest bread around, it seems highly unlikely it was created with cacao or espresso powder in soviet times.
Eventually, people started prizing this bread more and recipes evolved until we got the modern variant which most people (at least in Russia) find appetizing. It's possible the modern variant uses the more expensive color impacting ingredients, but it seems more likely that some trick that was used to make the original "dirt cheap" black bread is still employed or borrowed from today.
I’ve made a number of different variants following the recipes online and overall I’m happy with the results in terms of taste, but it’s driving me crazy that I can’t figure out how to make the loaf authentically black.
Welcome to Seasoned Advice and what an interesting question! Could you please add a photo of the product you are aiming for? This may help fine tune the answers.
There are two elements responsible for the darkness of “black bread”, which is a term used for different breads all over East, North and Central Europe
Whole grain flour, typically rye, but sometimes with a part wheat or spelt.
A low and slow bake, the probably most extreme example is Pumpernickel, which needs almost a day at 100-120 C and is more steamed than baked. Other recipes aim for 2.5 hours at 150 C. Above that, you will still get a good and dark bread, but more brown-grey than dark “black”.
The lower and slower, the darker will the bread turn out. Some sources claim that the darkness is caused by the Maillard reaction, but I am not sure whether this is the whole truth. Considering the temperature range, other factors like enzymes out of the grain are at least involved. The only “traditional” colorant I could find at a quick research was molasses or similar, which is used in some recipes.
Thank you Stephie! I've been using pumpernickel flour, but the low and slow bake is one technique I haven't heard recommended before. I'll give it a try with my next loaf and see how it turns out.
|
Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.768238
| 2020-07-22T23:00:26 |
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|
112574
|
Why does water color go red when you boil maizes or lentils? Is it bad?
I was boiling two maizes in a pot. After about twenty minutes the water inside the pot became red-colored. Also, some days before that, I was boiling lentils and the same happened.
Why did this happen and is this water safe to drink besides eating the maize and/or lentils?
This is probably due to anthocyanins present in the maize and lentils. Despite the possibly worrying sounding 'cyanin', anthocyanins are antioxidants and if anything, beneficial to one's diet. Anyway the amount of anthocyanins present in maize is far far less than in say red cabbage (see the table in the Wikipedia article), so I think you have nothing to worry about.
|
Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.768480
| 2020-11-10T12:46:36 |
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|
111009
|
Is it safe to keep reusing a portion of old dough?
My grandma told my mum a weird process of making flatbread dough recently that she started to use. But I am not sure about it's safety at all.
Initially, normal wholewheat bread dough made with Instant Yeast. Used to make bread but a small piece is kept (~70-100gm) in refrigerator.
Next day, when making new dough, that 70-100gm portion of old dough is mixed in and it's allowed to rise for 2-3 hours.
A 70-100gm portion of this mixture is kept again in refrigerator and mixed in next day.
Repeat same everyday.
The result is definitely great for the flatbread naan but I am not sure about safety of this.
Question: Wouldn't a small part of it be too old after 2 weeks or so? I am sure some of of the old dough remains, however diluted. Mom claims she'd start process totally fresh after a month but I believe that's too long.
Edit: I heard it's similar to Pâte Fermentée but I'm still not sure if about a whole cycle.
Are you familiar with sourdough starters? Seems like basically the same idea
@Kat I am familiar but never really worked with them. But yeah, I can see the similarity. I researched further and it does sounds even closer to preferments, specifically Pâte Fermentée.
This is how bread was made in my area just two generations before, not only flatbreads but every kind of dough. And the process wouldn't be started from scratch with new instant yeast, because it didn't exist yet.
I understand why you would say that a diluted piece of the old dough would remain after a month, but mind that fermentation is a metabolic process that converts molecules, and although actual atoms could be there, they were processed and rebuilt each time the dough ferments.
Compare that with any plant you eat; a part of this plant was a previous plant that was used as a fertilizer, maybe even passed through the animal metabolism. It's a cycle.
Thanks. That does make a lot of sense. Would you mind sharing the process you mentioned - or just the differences.
It's the same process as you described, just without restarting it with instant yeast. When making dough, add the old piece of dough in it and let it rise. Before shaping the bread, store a piece of dough for the next day. I guess the question is, where did the first piece of dough come from? I don't know, as the instant yeast is now prevalent, but I guess it was some kind of a sourdough starter. Btw. I never tried this, it's what my mom told me about her mom's process.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.768571
| 2020-10-04T22:18:26 |
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|
43518
|
Is carob bean cooked when used as a thickener?
Many yoghurts contain carob bean gum as a thickener. Does anyone know if this is raw or cooked carob bean ?
Are you not thinking of carageenan?
The full ingredients are .. Fromage Frais (from milk), Sugar, Cream, Strawberry Puree 2.5%, Chocolate 1.8% (Sugar, Cocoa Powder, Cocoa Mass, Cocoa Butter), Modified Maize Starch, Milk Mineral Concentrate, Thickener: Guar Gum, Carob Bean Gum, Xanthan Gum, Acidity Regulator: Citric Acid, Sodium Citrate, Flavourings, Colour: Carmine, Vitamin D.
Carob bean gum is extracted through industrial processes, not generally reproducible at home.
Per CAROB BEAN GUM
Chemical and Technical Assessment (CTA)
The seeds are dehusked by treating the kernels with dilute sulfuric
acid or with thermal mechanical treatment, elimination of the germ
followed by milling and screening of the endosperm (native carob bean
gum). The gum may be washed with ethanol or isopropanol to control
the microbiological load (washed carob bean gum). It may also be
further clarified (purified, extracted) by dispersing in hot water,
recovery with isopropanol or ethanol, filtering, drying and milling,
which is called as clarified (purified, extracted) carob bean gum.
Clarified carob bean gum in the market is normally standardized with
sugars for viscosity and /or reactivity.
|
Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.768777
| 2014-04-15T12:06:01 |
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|
61646
|
Fresh herbs going bad
When I buy fresh herbs from the grocery store they go bad too quickly what can I do to keep them fresher longer?
I just bought a vacuum sealer because I thought it would help preserve my food longer.
Should I seal and freeze or can they be kept in the frig?
It's almost a duplicate but IMHO the part about using a vacuum sealer warrants leaving it open. That said, Donna, have you checked the other question?
|
Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.768908
| 2015-09-10T18:55:12 |
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|
27636
|
What to do with leftover egg whites?
Possible Duplicate:
How does one find recipes given an ingredient rather than the recipe name?
I am a beginner cooker.
I have just cooked Carbonara Pasta, and I'm left with three or four egg whites.
Instead of throwing them out, what can be made with them?
Meringue or fried egg.
Everytime I'm left with egg whites and I'm wondering what to do with them, I make meringue. Then I wonder what to do with the meringue.
maybe you could ask the question, "what meals could be accompanied with meringue ?"... maybe there are salted flavours that would match very well. Maybe ;-)
@citizen: crumble them and use them to cover cakes! :)
This is a very open-ended question and not a great fit for a Q&A site. Please refer to our culinary uses guidelines and the linked recipe search question. There is certainly no shortage of egg-white recipes on any of those recipe-search sites; pick one that looks easy.
You can freeze egg whites and use them later.
You can make meringue cookies. Or Pavlova.
You can spread egg white on a pie, to give it a nice, glossy coat.
You could do something like an Angel Food cake. I'm not a fan of Angel Food so I would save and probably scramble them with some cheese and tomatoes (or whatever you like and have handy) the next day for breakfast. Another option is to make the Carbonara using whole eggs, no leftover whites to deal with then.
Then you'd have scrambled egg carbonara...
|
Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.769249
| 2012-10-06T11:55:01 |
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77745
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How can I make pierogi gluten-free?
I'm half Carpatho-Russian, the love of pierogies is in my blood, but my recent gluten sensitivity has stopped me from eating them, and I really miss them as they taste great and give you a lot of energy (the potatoes really help).
So can someone tell me what I need to swap out to make pierogi gluten-free?
I have no experience with them, but there are recipes out there for making your own gluten free pasta. I don't know how they'd hold up in sheets, though. epicurious ; serious eats
The main source of gluten in pierogi (the plural is pierogi, the singular is actually pierog) is the flour in the dough. You should be able to substitute regular flour for a gluten free version (eg rice flour) to make them gluten free. The same goes for whatever filling you are using, if you would regularly use flour as a thickening agent try corn starch or a gluten free flour instead. It's important to remember, however, that many gluten free flours do not bind as easily as wheat flour, and thus you may need to use more butter than usual.
EDIT
Pierogi dough, when made from scratch, dries very quickly, even moreso with gluten free flour. Be sure to cover the unused dough with a bowl and only take small chunks out at a time while you are forming and filling your pierogi.
Source: Was taught to make pierogi by an elderly Polish woman in my youth, have a niece and sister with celiac's disease
Can I replace the butter with something healther?
You can try using margarine or another butter substitute, but these rarely have the flavours one gets from real butter. The dough should still stay together, though. It's also important to remember many butter substitutes contain chemicals that can be worse for you than the fat in butter. I personally prefer to stick to real butter when cooking if possible, or imperial shortening if cooking for someone with a dairy sensitivity.
Any recommendation on gluten free flours for this application? I know some work better in cakes vs. breads, etc.
Rice flour should work well for this provided it is produced in a facility that does not process gluten.
Alternatively you may want to try potato flour, I have never tried it for pierogi but theoretically it should work.
And here I assumed it was "pierogus" all these years. (Just kidding.)
@Cameron : thanks. I had assumed you were taking about one of the (expensive) 'flour replacement' blends.
@Joe if you wanted to get particularly fancy you might try a blend of rice and potato flour, but I would not buy it pre-blended as as you say, they are quite expensive, and you can generally get more than double the amount for the same price if you blend it yourself. This is speculation but a blend of 3/4 rice to 1/4 potato flour would likely make very good pierogi dough, as the potato flour binds much more readily than rice flour, but using exclusively potato flour can lead to very heavy dough with a strong potato flavor.
@leeand00: healthier than butter?
I use olive oil, not butter.
@leeand00 You can go with flour, salt, milk (or even water) and nothing else and it still works all right. Butter or oil (traditionally rapeseed, sunflower) is optional.
If dairy is not a problem, I have found that finely ground GF flour blends that have powdered milk added perform and taste the best in all applications. One brand of such flours is Cup4Cup. There are also several GF cookbooks that have recipes for flour blends, one of the most thoroughly researched being the America's Test Kitchen book.
Keep in mind GF dough doesn't stretch so it's more of developing a technique to making the fold-over and seal without putting too much stress on the dough or it will tear. TIP: tortilla press! put a ball of dough inside plastic wrap or plastic bag cut out on 3 sides and use a tortilla press instead of a rolling pin.
We use a pasta roller in my house. It just takes too much effort and dries out the dough too much to do it manually with a rolling pin.
Hey Scott, thanks for the practical hint! Let me say that it would really have belonged in a comment as it does not directly address the inquiry, which was how to make the dough in the first place. Be sure to take the site [tour] to learn your way around, and here's some info on commenting.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.769444
| 2017-01-24T16:20:54 |
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|
64302
|
Green and white mold on dry part of onion only. What to do?
I purchased a bunch of red onions and then went a week or two without using them. When I went to use them last night, I discovered that most of them had grown lots of green and white mold.
This is strange to me - I'm used to onions lasting really long. In fact, the white onions in the same container were a few weeks older and had no mold or rot. The white onions aren't even moldy in the presence of the super moldy red onions, and neither are the potatoes or garlic in the same container!
The most interesting part, though, is that only the dry outer skin of the red onions are affected. The fleshier, shiny layers of skin have no mold.
What kind of mold grows so fast on dry onion skins?
Can we save anything in the bin?
Because nothing else is affected, your red onions probably acquired the mold spores before you purchased them. Perhaps they were stored in a humid area that facilitated the rapid growth.
Hopefully, you didn't store them in the refrigerator. Onions should be stored in a dry area of your kitchen or pantry in a manner that allows for good air circulation. Use a wicker or wire basket rather than than a plastic container.
I see a big red flag in your mentioning storing potatoes in the same container. Potatoes should never be stored in proximity with onions because onions give off a gas which will cause potatoes to spoil. Keep your potatoes in a separate area, preferably dark, and which also permits air to freely circulate.
Regarding what to do with the moldy onions now: wash off the mold and allow the onions to dry, and/or cook with them as soon as possible. After peeling off the outer skins, if the flesh of the onion looks good, with no mold or dark spoiled areas, then I think they'll be safe to use.
If you have too many onions to cook right away and are afraid the mold will progress, slice and/or dice the onions as desired, and blanch them in some boiling water. Then, seal the blanched onions tightly in one or more packages for freezing.
|
Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.769803
| 2015-12-11T03:14:11 |
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|
49071
|
How should I prepare venison hind leg sous vide?
I have a piece of venison I want to cook. The package says "hind leg". It is a 1kg piece without bones, in a rather round shape.
I want to use sous vide on this piece, but I am not sure what time/temperature should be used. I have searched many sites, but answers seems to vary.
Some sites suggest treating it like tender beef; heating it up to around 57 degrees (time depending on thickness of course).
Other sites suggests treating it for really long cooking times, as one would with brisket or short ribs.
Does anyone have any experiences that I could replicate?
How much is lean meat? How much is cartilage/sinew/silverskin/any of that tough stuff that is chewy when cooked for a short amount of time, but jelly after a long amount of time? How lean is the meat?
I must admit I am not sure how to decide how much is lean. Is there a standard technique to figure this out? There is little cartilage/silverskin on it.
There isn't a very standard technique to find out if it's lean, just .. see how much of the meat has fat running through it or around it. If there's little cartilage/silverskin/tendon/whatever on it, then treating it like tender beef sounds about right. If you're particularly worried, or want to knuckle down a procedure for next time, I would probably cut and package it up into several bags, and keep taking a bag out after (1) it's just cooked to 57 degrees, if you are noticing lots of gristly bits, then (2) after 12 hours (3) after 24 hours (4) after 36 hours, until you are happy.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.770018
| 2014-10-20T06:39:36 |
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|
112322
|
How to deal with strong, sizable spices?
I've been making a lot of Indian food, and I've repeatedly had problems with certain spices being "overpowering" when you get a bite of them. I'm talking specifically about cardamom and cloves, although cinnamon is also problematic since you can't really eat/chew it.
Usually, recipes have you add them in great enough numbers that you can't really just sift through and pull them out by hand. I saw a recommendation to stick them with toothpicks to make retrieval easier, but I'm not sure that would work with cloves (and I'd be worried about someone accidentally biting down on said toothpick).
I've considered using powdered spices, but I'm not sure if it's the same flavor - and most recipes I've seen call for whole spices, not powdered.
I've tried peeling away the cardamom pod and using the tiny seeds inside, but I end up with the same issue - even the tiny seeds give an overpowering lemon-ish flavor when you eat them.
How can I prevent large spices from overpowering all other flavors when they're consumed?
Welcome to SA! Thanks for posting a well-written question.
Simple: spit them out.
You're not supposed to eat whole cardamom pods or cloves, any more than you'd eat whole cinnamon sticks, bay leaves, or slices of dried galangal. Each diner is expected to spit them out, or pick them out of their food, and set them aside on their plate.
Whole coriander seed, cumin seed, and other small spices are meant to be eaten, but these aren't as intensely flavored.
Cardamom pods you can often detect before you bite down on them but cloves are much smaller, often you bite down on them before you know they are there.
@GdD I often struggle to detect cardamom pods, particularly in sauces of a similar colour
I'm not talking about finding them visually @Tristan, it's more of a texture thing. Your mouth kind of gets to know them and you find yourself picking them out.
A worried cook could always dye the unpalatable bits blue.
@GdD again, often not in my experience. In a thick sauce, or with rice, or meat, or other things in there it's often not easy to pick out the cardamom before you've already bitten into it
What can I say? It's what folks do in India. The tradition of eating with your fingers makes it easier to pick stuff out, but folks seem to be able to do it even when using a fork.
Huh. I always just eat cloves, bay leaves, and slices of dried galangal. Seems unnecessarily fussy to start picking out spices and leaving them lying on the plate/table, especially when they actually are edible. Besides, I enjoy the flavor. (Cinnamon sticks aren't exactly edible, but they're much larger and therefore easier to pick out. I don't think I've ever even been served a dish with whole cinnamon sticks in it anyway.)
Fresh galangal slices are also hard/inedible.Although I can't imagine ever using dried ones - fresh galangal deteriorates and gets harder over time, and is harder to cut/grind/blend/pound, so dried galangal just seems like an extreme version of stale galangal...
Another option is to pay attention while you are about to take a spoonful and separate out the spice before you eat the morsel.
@thelawnet dried is useful when you just can't get fresh. It's sliced before drying.
@FuzzyChef hehe I do not eat the coriander seeds :P
For whole spices which are hard to pick out, you could try make a bouquet garni. Wrap the whole spices into a bundle, using cheesecloth, a piece of muslin (undyed, loosely woven fabric), a coffee filter tied with string, a tea strainer, or a drawstring tea bag (example).
(image source)
This is a technique commonly used for soup making. Depending on the dish, you may find that some types of spice bundle will fall apart, or that the spices will not get as evenly distributed through the dish as intended. I expect that this technique will work better for thinner sauces, and may not work well for thicker sauces.
For recipes which call for adding the spices directly to hot oil, a bouquet garni will not work for this step. After heating the spices in the oil, usually other ingredients are added, and eventually the dish is converted into a sauce. You could remove the whole spices after heating them in oil, package them up into a bundle, and put them back into the simmering sauce to steep further. Or, as J pointed out in comments, you could simply omit them after removing them from the oil, because most of the flavor will have already gone into the oil.
No, no, no, no! Not for indian cuisine. OP's spices are meant to go directly into hot oil as the first step of cooking in the tempering step. If you just put them into the liquidy watery curry afterwards it's not the same thing at all. They have to toast in the hot oil - this is where all the magic of indian food comes from. You can fish out the very large spices after the tempering step but you absolutely cannot skip this step and just throw the spices in later.
@J... Am I missing something? Where does this answer say to skip a step or to put the spices in later? It's just saying to wrap them in a bundle for easier removal before serving.
@Tashus You cannot put cheesecloth, twine, muslin, a coffee filter, or anything else of the sort in hot oil at tempering temperature. They will burn and destroy the dish. Conceivably you could temper everything and then pick out the large inedible spices and then subsequently wrap them in cheesecloth or put them into a spice infuser for the rest of the cooking, but that's a lot of mess, tools, and cleanup for not so much payoff. Most of the flavour comes out in the oil anyway, so easier just to pick out the larger inedible spices after tempering.
@J... Ah, thank you. That explains it. Are there any materials that would work? Wire mesh, food grade silicone, etc?
@J... I updated my answer to reflect your point that a bundle will not work in hot oil (I was assuming that was obvious, but in hindsight I see that it's not.) I was thinking of spices that would be added to the sauce after the tempering step (or for recipes that skip the tempering step).
@csk When hard spices like cardamom, cloves, cinnamon, anis, etc, are added in Indian cooking after tempering it is almost always as ground spices, typically in something like garam masala that is added at the end of cooking. Whole spices are typically used exclusively at the tempering step. Also why it's not needed to reserve the whole spice you remove - if you want more fragrance at the end you just boost up with garam masala.
You might get away with something like a stainless steel infuser? Not sure if that'd be able to take hot oil but maybe if stainless steel — an 'at your own risk' suggestion :)
@anotherdave Still seems cumbersome. The metal will suck the heat out of your oil, and tempering is usually done in a pretty shallow amount of oil, so you really need the spices to spread out on the bottom of the pan - the oil also needs to be able to slide around freely to pick up heat from the whole pan surface.
You could get a spice grinder and grind them. If you do it at the time of cooking (rather than buying preground spices) you're unlikely to get a significant decrease in quality of flavour
Do be aware though that a fine powder will pack much more tightly, and impart a greater amount of their flavour into the sauce, than loose whole spices and so you'll likely need smaller quantities (and measure before grinding not after, 1 tsp of ground cloves is a lot more clove than 1 tsp of whole cloves)
If you don't have a spice grinder you could chop them or gently crush in a mortar and pestle. I do this when I cook with whole cardamom because whilst I love the flavour cardamom imparts to the food, I detest the sensation of accidentally biting into a whole pod. A quick bash in a mortar and pestle breaks the pods up into the individual seeds (which is where most of the flavour is, and are small enough not to cause bad sensations) and the case of the pod (which has less of a pleasant flavour and sensation even after cooking, so I'll often remove)
Will pre-grinding the spices cause any issues when I fry them at the start?
I'm not sure. I have seen people toast spices before grinding, but usually only if they're doing so in a dry pan, it's possible frying before grinding might gum it up
Most spices are actually fine after they've fried whole in oil. Cumin, star anise, etc - all of these hard spices become crispy and much more crumbly after proper tempering so that you can just chew them and they break up easily. If you're going to grind spices my suggestion would be to either dry toast and grind (adding later), or grind raw and then mix into the fresh ginger/garlic so that they become part of a slightly wet paste. The water will help hydrate the spice so that you can fry the paste in oil without burning the fine ground spices. Timing becomes more important here.
As a half way to this — you could try lightly bashing the spices in a mortar & pestle. Just enough to crack them without going to a powder. You're less likely to get a big chunk, but will still have mostly whole pieces.
Depending on exactly what you're making, there are a few options to remove the spices before being served.
For soups and thin sauces, you can use either a teaball or tie it up in cloth, so you can remove them all easily.
If there is citrus in the dish, you can push cloves into a section of citrus peel, but you'll want to be careful that you don't knock it around so much that you knock them free from the peel.
In other cases, you can sometimes infuse the oil that's being used, remove the spices, and then continue the dish using just the oil. (this technique is used with garlic in som areas of Italy). Unfortunately, not all flavors are oil soluble, so you may not get the same flavors, or as deep of flavors as you would get leaving the spices in there the whole time.
But as people have said -- leaving inedible things in the meal is cultural. It's possible that it might be related to the utensils used, as well -- eating with chopsticks would give you much more selectivity than shoveling your food down with a spoon. And there are some cultures where it's normal to spit things back out -- so you can add olives with pits, but people know not to just chomp into them.
You're probably onto something with the utensil part: Indian food is, classically, eaten with your hands. Which makes it much easier to feel and pick out whole spices if you want to.
Count them out beforehand, and remember or even write down the counts, so you know when you are finished sifting them out. If it is a curry, make use of any opportunity where you add water and have the curry in a relatively thin state, sifting will be easiest then. Sometimes, you can use a combination of easy to remember spice counts, eg "1 tejpat, 1 cinnamon stick, 1 piece of javentri, 2 motti elaichi, 3 hari elaichi, 4 laung".
Agreed on the counting ... and never use torn bay leaves in thick sauces
Primarily I agree with FuzzyChef - just don't eat them. (I'm not Indian, and I eat with a fork, but I still don't find that a problem.)
With cloves specifically though, I would add that if they're tough, strong, and unpleasant post-cooking, they probably haven't been in there long enough. Generally cloves break down to an extent that it's no different to eating something into which you cracked black pepper while cooking - which can also be crunchy and unpleasant if it's too large too late, but it softens with cooking and disintegrates/disperses flavour.
I'll even occasionally chew on cinnamon if it's stewed long enough, but I'd never eat cardamom, even without the stringy texture it'd just be like a mouthful of tea leaves.
Curry leaves soften a lot and should be eaten, if they seem unappetising they definitely haven't been cooked long enough. Bay leaves remain much tougher, but are also larger and extremely easy to leave aside on the plate or not even serve.
I really don't think you should notice seeds like cumin, coriander, caraway, fennel, mustard, etc. in one mouthful from the next without them (and probably each one should contain them anyway!) - but if it really bothers you, you could grind them to a powder, then mix in some water to form a paste before adding to the hot oil, to prevent burning (since each 'piece' now has a much smaller surface area). Then proceed as normal, but faster, as if already toasted and fragrant if they were whole.
Hmm, that comment about me not cooking the cloves long enough is interesting, and makes it sound like I can solve half my problem by just stewing the dish for longer! :)
I might just try that, and add less cardamom. Cinamon isn't the biggest deal either, just annoying.
I find the most bothersome whole spice in that regard is mace/javentry - it disintegrates enough to be difficult to fish out, but does not disintegrate enough to distribute itself, and biting on a blade of mace is a rather unpleasant thing....
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Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.770198
| 2020-10-26T21:50:22 |
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112551
|
How to prepare rice in rice cooker so it won't become sticky or clumpy, like Indian takeout in the US?
When I get Indian takeout (US), the white rice is not at all sticky or clumpy. Even over the next few days it can be essentially poured out of the container as individual grains. This is unlike the rice in say, Chinese takeout, which is much stickier and in a single mass.
I have a very simple rice cooker. (It has the settings "white rice" and "brown rice".) How can I use this rice cooker, and any necessary preparation/finalization steps or types of rice, to produce rice like I get from Indian takeout? Ideally that can be eaten straight out of the rice cooker, but I'm willing to be flexible if necessary.
See https://cooking.stackexchange.com/questions/93336/how-to-cook-perfect-long-grain-rice Personally, I had a rice cooker for about a year before I just threw it away. I can make far better rice [of any type] just in a pan than it could make.
Tetsujin: rice cookers have an enormous convenience value, in that you don't have to watch them at all. And good ones do perfectly good rice, even if you can do slightly better on the stovetop.
@Tetsujin a lot of countries exclusively use rice cookers, and even where people are happy to spend many hours cooking speciality dishes, they still use rice cookers, because it works perfectly. However it is an absorption method, which works well with high GI rice, but if you have a rice best cooked by some other method, such as Basmati, then maybe it's not the best. However a couple of billion people eat the same high GI rice every day, and they cook it in rice cookers. It is rather unlikely that you could consistently cook their rice better than their CPU-controlled rice cookers.
@thelawnet - I've been cooking rice for 40 years. I've pretty much got it nailed now, thanks.
@Tetsujin I'm sure your rice is fine - it sounds like the problem was with your rice cooker, as a good one will work perfectly.
@thelawnet - we could argue this back & forth all day. I bought it in Japan not Walmart, it wasn't cheap by any standards. I can only presume it was of sufficient quality. However, I can still do better in a pan. Thank you.
@FuzzyChef The convenience of a rice cooker is dependent on various factors, including things like how much space you have on your counter vs your stove and how much time you have. Rice cookers typically take quite a bit longer to cook rice than cooking it on the stove, and rice cookers take up considerable counter space. For me these two factors make having one a non-starter, so I'm with Tetsujin on this. But as they say YMMV.
Yah, I just saw the first comment on a first-time askers first post be "don't use that piece of equipment", so I had to supply a contrasting opinion.
a large factor on rice cookers is how much you eat rice. Where I live per capita rice consumption is 200kg/year. And my dogs also eat rice. So even for people with little space, a rice cooker is an essential appliance, far more popular than electric kettles (unpopular because a lot of electricity meters are restricted often to 450W, 900W or 1300W for a house), ovens (not a big part of the cuisine), toasters (bread is not a staple) and microwaves . If you eat rice only twice a month, it's not the same as for those who eat it 3 times a day.
@thelawnet Are you talking about the quality of the rice or the skill of the chef?
@adamaero I forget English doesn't distinguish between raw and cooked rice lol. The cooked outcome
First, use basmati rice. Then, rinse your rice very well. Place rice in bowl, fill with cold water, drain, repeat until the water runs clear. I find that using the correct variety of rice, combined with good rinsing, helps keep the long grains separate.
Also not buying the cheapest rice available really helps. When I would buy the cheapest available basmatic, the quality of the rice kernels themselves varied greatly, with many broken, split or damaged grains, which would tend to stick/glob up.
I second washing the rice many times (until the water runs clear). Marginally reducing the water used in the rice cooker also helps (by about 15%) - at least it did in my case.
There are many different ways of cooking rice, and you might not want to use a rice cooker if you really want individual grains, as it was developed for cuisines / rice varieties that are stickier.
Although moscafj mentioned basmati, which is a very long grain variety of rice that's from India, and tends to cook up less sticky ... you might also consider "parboiled" rice which tends to not stick together at all. But I suspect that you would have to vary the amount of water used so it doesn't become a big glob.
There's a technique of cooking rice in which you cook it like pasta -- in a large amount of water, and then drain it. This should reduce surface starch and prevent it from clumping. There are variations on this where you boil it part way, drain it, then steam to finish (possibly fluffing it up as it steams to make sure it doesn't develop clumps)
And then there's pilaf / plau / pulao style of cooking rice ... in which you first cook the rice (and possibly some finely diced vegetables, or even meat) in some oil or butter, then add the water, cover, and bake it. This tends to result in more individual grains of rice, provided you don't develop a socarrat / tahdig (the crispy layer of rice at the bottom of the pot, like in paella making).
If you're really set on using a rice cooker, I would specifically put in less water than it called for, and then check the rice once it switches over to warm, and check to see if it's cooked through. If it isn't, I'd add a little more water and turn it back on. (mechanical switch rice cookers might need a minute or two to cool before you can turn it back to 'cook', due to how the mechanism works).
Once it's cooked through, use a fork to 'fluff' the rice, dumping the loosened rice into a sheet pan, casserole pan, directly onto people's plates, or some other wide vessel that lets you spread out the rice without it being too deep.) If you see any clumps, use your fork to break it up, or clean hands to try to 'rub' grains apart like you would couscous.
As an added bonus for parboiling, a study that came out very recently found that parboiling rice first may substantially reduce arsenic levels in rice. Rice tends to accumulate arsenic more-so than a lot of other grains because of the way it is grown in flooded fields. Source: https://scitechdaily.com/scientists-find-new-way-of-cooking-rice-that-removes-arsenic-and-retains-nutrients/
Note that your "pasta style" method using extra water and discarding it will significantly reduce nutrients (like vitamins) in the rice; avoiding that while reducing arsenic was the point of the research @anjama cited.
The reason why the two types of rice that you mentioned are different in texture is because Indian takeout restaurants generally use white Basmati rice, Chinese takeout restaurants generally use white Jasmine rice. They are different rice varieties that were selectively bred over generations from wild Asian rice. Basmati rice has a lower glycemic index than Jasmine rice, so it contains more simple starches and does not stick together as much as Jasmine rice does.
Indian takeout restaurants do not typically use rice cookers to cook their rice, as Basmati does not cook in the same way that Jasmine does. Instead, it is generally cooked on the stovetop using vegetable oil in the process, shown here.
There are three different methods in the instructions you linked to. You might be able to use the "microwave" instructions but replace the microwaving steps with the rice cooker. Although I suspect you'd get better results with the other two.
The process is very simple. Buy long-grain basmati rice. Allow to soak for 10-15 minutes. Rinse thoroughly (water should run clear), then add the water and operate your rice cooker as normal. Make sure to fluff the rice as soon as it's done. This may not be the way most Indian restaurants do it but the results are indistinguishable.
Cooking non-fluffy basmati rice can be even simpler than this. Put one measure of rice and two measures of cold water (measuring by volume) in a large pan. (The pan should be only 1/4 full or less, otherwise it may bubble over when simmering.) Optionally, add a little salt. Heat on full until it starts to simmer, then simmer for 10 minutes. All the water will have been absorbed by the rice. Job done. No soaking, washing, or special purpose rice cooker necessary.
@alephzero If you already have a rice cooker, as the OP does, I think it's the easiest thing to do to use it. You don't have to pay any attention, after all.
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.771270
| 2020-11-09T15:06:28 |
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|
27218
|
Why does my walnut cake fall?
The recipe uses 3 eggs for volume, separated, yolks and sugar whipped over hot water until triple in volume, whites whipped to stiff peaks. Ground walnuts, 2 tbsp breadcrumbs, 1/4 c butter are all folded in. baked at 350 for 40 minutes.
During baking it looks great, rises and is perfection. On cooling the center starts to fall, then the sides turn into the center.
How do you stop it falling? Am i overwhipping?
A key fact is missing: how much ground walnut? It's quite possible to make a flourless nut torte that not only doesn't fall, but is also capable of standing up to a heavy frosting; but it needs to contain enough nuts (and enough egg white) to provide structure, because --unlike bread-- a torte is not based on trapping air in a matrix of gluten.
This "cake" is practically a souffle, and falls for the same reason a souffle does: it has nothing to keep it tall. It first rises because of the steam created during baking, but once the steam production is over, it deflates. Unlike real cakes, which include flour, there is nothing to create a persistent structure here.
There is nothing to prevent a souffle from falling when it has cooled, it is like expecting a punctured baloon to stay inflated. I would suggest using a different recipe. Alternatively, you can decide that you are OK with a moist, fudgy cake without much rise. To avoid a mishappen shape from first rising too much and then falling, whip the eggs less and combine them more thoroughly with the rest of the ingredients, while still keeping some air in.
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.771969
| 2012-09-17T15:25:07 |
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|
121201
|
How Can Cooked Meat Still Have Protein Value?
I've been taught 2 things that seem to contradict each other:
Cooked meat has plenty of protein
Heating proteins denatures them and damages/changes them
If this is the case, then cooked meat must have very little usable protein, which is clearly not the case.
How does protein in a fully cooked food, e.g. chicken/pork/eggs survive the cooking process in a usable form?
Note I'm not asking about burnt meat, browning or flavour reactions, or rare meat e.g. a medium/rare cooked steak.
Note this is my first Q here and I wasn't sure if this should go here or on a chemistry stack. If so happy for this to be migrated. ( also no protein tag?! )
I think this is a fair question and hopefully someone with the expertise can give a full answer. I expect that the issue of heat is no different to strong stomach acids which will also denature, change and break down the proteins – the digestive process is all about breaking food into constituent components which the body then uses.
My judgement is that this is a "nutrition" question and therefore off-limits for this SE. That's also why there's no "protein" tag.
@FuzzyChef Indeed, it's really a question about digestion, so perhaps a better fit for Biology SE?
oh I don't give a hoots about digestion, it's the cooking process itself I'm interested in
Think of it like recycling glass. The glass is smashed into pieces and rebuilt into a new bottle.
Note that I am not asking for nutritional or medical advice, I have no interest in the dietary consequences of this and the nutritional value of cooked food is of no consequence to me. It's the act of cooking itself that I'm asking about
Ever heard of prions? Those are proteins and cooking doesn't destroy them enough.
Denatured proteins are still proteins, just different proteins. Proteins have multiple structures, each important to their function. Primary, Secondary, Tertiary and even Quaternary structure. Changing any of those will damage their ability to function correctly.
Your stomach acids also denature any proteins that you ate raw...
Cars have iron in them. Heating cars can damage and melt the iron in them. Melting the iron in a car does not reduce the amount of iron in them.
Structural proteins in foods, i.e. albumin in eggs, myosin in muscle meats, gluten in wheat, are formed by amino acids in complex structures. Proteins are folded and clumped chains of peptides, and peptides are chains of amino acids. Your body uses stomach acid and proteases (enzymes) to break down proteins in digestion, but this requires time and energy (stomach churning, body heat).
The amino acids are what your body requires. They're used to build more complex proteins. Cooking gives a head start in un-clumping/unfolding proteins, and in some conditions into peptides and amino acids, that are easier for your body to digest making them more 'bioavailable'.
Some of these amino acids can be produced by your body using nitrogen compounds from breaking down other amino acids and nutrients. The ones your body can't produce on its own have to be obtained in the proteins you eat. These are called 'essential amino acids'.
Different protein sources have different amino acid compositions, giving them different 'protein values' in how complete the range of essential amino acids are available; i.e. collagen/gelatin is a common structural protein that provides great texture for sensory applications, but the protein value is 0 for regulatory labelling requirements in some countries since it is missing an essential amino acid.
This is why the discovery how how to make fire was such an important point in human development; cooking gave more nutrition from food, less hunting was needed, more time could be spent on other pursuits.
I'd move The amino acids are what your body requires. to the top or highlight, maybe even TL;DR. That is the essence of the answer.
@manassehkatz-Moving2Codidact exactly what I was going to reply. The reason denaturing protein isn’t bad is that we didn’t need that protein in the first place.
At least collagen makes more collagen (which the body needs to make).
Minor nitpick from a pedantic biologist: "Proteins are folded and clumped chains of peptides, and peptides are chains of amino acids.". That's not quite right. Peptides are simply pieces of protein chains. Proteins are made up of folded and clumped chains of amino acids, not of peptides.
The denaturing of proteins refers to their physical structure, not their nutritional value. This might help. As is detailed in the link, heat, acid, salt, alcohol, and mechanical agitation can cause proteins to denature. This denaturing is when the folded strands of protein unfurl into a long strand of amino acids.
Another way to think about proteins and tissue is like lego blocks. Imagine the tissue or steak you eat is a well-crafted lego structure, for example a building. Heating it might break apart some of the corridors, or remove a floor from the other floor but the individual lego pieces are still mostly intact. What your body needs from the protein you eat are individual amino acids, legos in this case. Your body must still further break down the corridors/building floors (steak) into individual legos (amino acids) which your body can absorb in your small/large intestine.
In this case, cooking might slightly break down your building (steak) but it won't break it down all the way to the level of individual legos (amino acids) which your body needs.
Another analogy would be, if you smash up a car engine so it cannot run anymore, the engine is 'destroyed' yet you still have all the scrap metal. And as our body wants protein in the smallest possible scraps (amino acids) cooking, denaturing, smashing up, is useful. Becuase proteins have complex strucures that enable them carry out their purpose, changes to the structure 'destroy' the protein, i.e. destroy their ability to carry out their purpose.
Note that denatured alcohol is different. the structure of alcohol is too simple to destroy (unfold). Denatured alcohol cannot be used for it's main purpose (getting you nice and drunk) because something has been added that makes it undrinkable (like the hideous taste of some alcohol gels if you use them, then eat food then try to lick your fingers).
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.772158
| 2022-07-31T18:36:21 |
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|
89880
|
is it safe to be behind a microwave while it's on?
In our restaurant we have the microwaves in the open where you can be behind it while it's on. Usually in normal houses you don't see the back, only the front. Is it safe to be behind it while it's on? I know it sounds like a dumb question, but I heard someone say once that it wasn't safe, because of radiation or something. just wanna be safe.
Kitchen equipment is generally designed to be safe except for the really obvious, e.g. don't touch a hot stove or a sharp blade, and don't put electrical appliances in water. So in general, I might suggest having a look at manuals and warning labels to get a sense of what you do and don't have to worry about. A lot of your past and potential future questions could probably be answered this way.
The back is safer than the front as it doesn't have a door.
A home grade (or dual use unit), unless defective beyond reason (eg if there is a hole in it or an interlock is broken) will be always safe from all directions, since any risk of harming persons or animals and/or creating radio interference (Microwave ovens share a frequency band with WiFI!) behind a wall or in the room below or above is unacceptable.
Same can be expected to apply to a commercial unit, unless it would be some very special device not intended to be used as a normal microwave oven (eg one meant to be operated on a conveyor), which can be expected to come with very clear warnings attached in that case.
Yes, microwaves are safe, no matter which side you're on. There's probably a warning label on your microwaves, and you can double-check to ease your mind about any other possibilities; I imagine it will say things like not to take it apart and not to immerse it in water, but it is safe when used normally.
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.772767
| 2018-05-18T21:23:47 |
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|
114710
|
What would cause the peel of a lime to turn yellow?
About a week ago, I purchased two limes, a lemon, a couple of kiwi fruits, and some oranges. When I got home, I placed them in a bowl. One of the limes ended up at the bottom of the bowl but there were still enough gaps between the fruit that it wasn't completely hidden, and there weren't enough fruits above it that the lime was in danger of being squashed.
I've since used up all the fruit but the limes. This afternoon, when I picked up the lemon to use, I noticed that the lime that was partly underneath had changed color from green to yellow. Here is a photograph of the two limes:
Why has the lime on the right turned yellow? It was purchased at the same time as the one on the left and stored in the same bowl.
Ethylene, most likely.
You've said that that lime was at the bottom of the bowl, mostly covered with other fruit. I'll bet it was very close to some kiwis.
Fruit -- particularly "climacteric" fruit like kiwi which ripens after being picked -- produces and releases ethylene. Ethylene serves a key role in fruit ripening. This is why you're advised to keep bananas in a closed paper bag to ripen them: the ethylene gas produced by the bananas builds up and ripens them faster. In open air, ethylene concentrations (in the fruit, not just around it) remain lower, and ripening is retarded.
In fact, citrus producers commonly use ethylene gas to artificially ripen ("de-green") the rind of citrus fruit. This would normally be done for lemons and oranges, which are commonly picked when still slightly green.
While you didn't have a fully closed container, it sounds like the lime was deep enough in the bowl for some concentration of ethylene, produced largely by the kiwis, to build up around it, ripening at least the rind of the lime. (Yes, some limes are yellow when fully ripe -- limes at the store are picked unripe because consumers like the look of green ones.)
Congratulations on your accidental biochemistry experiment.
Fascinating. The other lime was in the same bowl ... right next to the kiwis. Just that the one that turned yellow was below the kiwis and so had less leeway to escape the ethylene, I guess.
Makes sense. Ethylene gas is much heavier than air. It'll build up in a depressed area like a bowl unless there's sufficient air movement to blow it away.
@Sneftel, it gets even better, limes are climacteric ripeners, so they won't ripen further after picking... unless you expose them to ethylene. This one was exposed to higher concentrations of ethylene, so ripened quicker than the other. Bananas are non-climacteric so are actually triggered to ripen before they are placed in the shops. Picked green, kept in constant air-flow to reduce ethylene concentration, they won't ripen, but supply a small bit of ethylene and they will start the process and then it can't be stopped, you can only speed it up with more ethylene.
@Sneftel My sources say density of ethylene is 1.18 kg per cubic meter, while density of air is 1.225 kg per cubic meter.
Yellow limes: I bought a little lime tree in a pot, and was very disappointed indeed when the fruit ripened yellow. But they taste and smell like limes, so I suppose I got a yellow lime tree.
@RedSonja were you worried you might have been .. sold a lemon?
@njuffa Huh, that's what I get for trusting Wolfram Alpha. Just the effect of air circulation, then.
@njuffa It gets very complicated because eythlene is denser than nitrogen and air is mostly nitrogen. Air can easily stratify in a small, semi-enclosed space if obstacles prevent sufficient turbulent mixing.
@David Schwartz I was specifically commenting on (my emphasis) "Ethylene gas is much heavier than air". By no means an expert, but I would assume that in a small closed space, air does not de-mix into layers of nitrogen and oxygen due to ongoing diffusion.
@njuffa Right. But if the fact that nitrogen is less dense than ethylene doesn't matter due to mixing, neither does the fact that ethylene is less dense than air. (I'm agreeing with you. The individual densities either don't really matter due to diffusion or still bring ethylene mostly to the bottom due to it being denser than nitrogen.)
@DavidSchwartz - I think in this case it is merely more mixing and less mixing respectively, nothing to do with stratification. The fruit at the top had greater airflow and mixing with lower local concentration, so didn't ripen; the one at the bottom had less airflow and mixing in confined space so greater local concentration and did ripen.
@pjc50 — blimey, what a terrible joke.
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.772940
| 2021-03-10T09:21:10 |
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|
64435
|
How to make a vegetarian coffee jelly?
I have tried to make coffee jelly with agar, but that was disappointing. Even high-quality beans did not get me any good result, compared with gelatin-based recipes: The texture is different, but it is mainly the taste that disturbed me. I expect, perhaps, to have a neutral base for the jelly, so that the coffee flavour remains plain and strong. I also like the smoothness of gelatin compared with, say, agar.
Is there a good combination of beans and ingredients to make a vegetarian coffee jelly?
Som extra details:
Tried with agar only.
Hot coffee added to the mix.
Temperature-room cooling, then fridge cooling.
Could you please clarify: Did you use hot or cooled coffee, what were the good / fail recipes?
Have you used agar before? The texture is never the same as that of gelatine, so if that's your expenctation, the jelly will always "fail".
Thank you for your feedbacks. I have tried to refine the question accordingly.
I've used agar agar before with this recipe. Although I've never tried it myself with coffee beans, the trick might be to use instant coffee, which is what I find is almost the case with other desserts with coffee flavor. I also add 1 teaspoon of vanilla essence right at the end, which lifts the flavor and also sieve before letting it set. I generally put it in the fridge and speed up the setting process.
With gelatin on the glossy, bouncy, and stretchy end, and agar sort of on the opposite... perhaps OP can try konnyaku, a starch developed by the Japanese and currently much used in their (& Chinese & Korean) snack products...
It's from a root plant, and behaves somewhere inbetween the gelatin and agar... Glossy and bouncy like the former (stretches just a tad less), vegan like the latter, and remains comfortably solid in room temperature...
In Hong Kong Starbucks I've had a cold latte with little coffee jelly cubes in it... Think it's konnyaku from the texture... While I think it's from a supplier, what OP wants to make definitely exists...
So do look it up and see how it works out, eh ?
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.773340
| 2015-12-15T10:29:18 |
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121984
|
Is there a distinction between fleur de sel and sel de Guérande?
On a recent trip to Paris, I wanted to buy some fleur de sel as a gift, but I found nothing that was specifically noted as such. Instead, I found sel de Guérande, which largely seems like the same thing? Watching this video, I understand that:
La fleur de sel c'est le sel qui va cristalliser à la surface de l'eau. Le gros sel ce sera le seul qui va cristalliser au fond de l'eau sur l'argile. Donc c'est ça qui fait la différence entre les deux.
The fleur de sel is the salt that will crystallize on the surface of the water. The coarse salt is the only one that will crystallize at the bottom of the water on the clay. So that's what makes the difference between the two.
I wonder if sel de Guérande is perhaps the name given to the salt colored by the clay? Or is there a difference? The only other question I saw was this one, whose answer notes "Salt is salt is salt". I realize I'm splitting hairs, but I'm curious nonetheless.
Fleur de sel is a flaky salt (same as Maldon salt).
It can be from Guérande or from other sea salt fields.
Guérande salt can be any type of sea salt from that region.
It can be fine, coarse or Fleur de sel.
Anecdotal, I buy coarse grey Guérande salt (still wet) and use it as my main salt, I use it coarse or I grind some for regular use, I also use local flaky salt (from Québec).
Thanks! Mine is definitely the coarse, gray, wet salt. I figured it could be used just like any other salt, modulo the differences between fine, fleur, kosher, etc., but I wasn't sure if this coarse salt is essentially fleur de sel.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.773549
| 2022-10-15T21:19:00 |
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64767
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Dividing Pizza dough to balls before baking
I see in a lot of recipes for Pizza baking that you need to divide the whole mass into several balls before the first proofing or before you make the pizza. I find it more convenient to just have the whole mass together until I actually need to bake and then I just take a chunk and leave the rest in the container.
Anyone know why they recommend dividing it before? What's wrong with the method I mentioned?
Probably so that the gluten can relax before you go for the final forming.
By forming it into a ball you are starting it towards "pizza pie disk shape" from "formless mass of dough." If it rests for 10 minutes or more in that shape, proceeding to further shape it into a disk will go easier (and further, if desired), with less spring-back from the gluten network.
I use roughly the same process in making bagels or long strips for braiding. You can work it until it just won't go anymore, take a break, and come back to find it pliable and willing to stretch further.
Thank you for the answer. One question remains though - if I let the dough ferment in the fridge for 2 days as one big mass and then take it out and divide it before baking (letting it proof in small chunks) it will be the same result correct?
@John Should be pretty much the same, IME, yes.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.773700
| 2015-12-24T22:02:19 |
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44596
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Should I retire my scratched non-stick rice cooker?
I am the lucky owner of a George Foreman Multicooker which is essentially a fancy rice cooker with a removable steaming basket. It has a non-stick cooking surface they call "George-Tough" coating. Right. I googled around a bit. I didn't see any definitive identification on this stuff but I figure it's probably Teflon.
I left the cooker with a friend for a month or so while I was out of town. I brought it out to cook up some rice this evening and it appears that the non-stick surface has been badly damaged. After fumbling around with it, it appears that somebody tilted the lid at an angle and set it down inside the cooker. Presumably while it was still turned on.
Should I kick George to the curb or is there some way to salvage my favorite lazy man's kitchen tool?
You can "repair" it by scrubbing the damaged area clear of loose material, then coating the area with seasoning oil of choice and heating that area until the oil polymerises. Do this a few times to make a decent permanent repair
There is no way to salvage it, no. The Teflon will stay scratched and flake into your food. Even after you remove the large flakes, it will continue shedding microscopic ones.
We cannot tell you anything about "should" or make decisions for you. If the risk of eating Teflon is acceptable to you, keep it. If it isn't, throw it out. Discussions on the long-term health effects of consuming Teflon in tiny amounts fall into the "is it healthy" category, which is unanswerable for us. As always, there are the people who say it's terrible, and the ones who say it's no big deal. You have to find other sources and decide whether you want to believe them.
I personally would steer on the side of safety and chuck George in the bin. Paying $50 for a new midrange rice cooker is less than possibly playing with my and my family's safety.
+1 for a neutral and judicious answer, but I'd agree with @jsanc623 that the maxim "when in doubt, throw it out" applies here.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.773850
| 2014-06-01T21:44:51 |
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44736
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How to cleanly slice hard-boiled eggs?
After some furious brainstorming in The Frying Pan, I recently prepared some hors d'oeuvres for a group of friends. These snacks were meant to include a thinly sliced boiled egg element. Unfortunately I found that I did not have a technique that reliably produced egg slices at my desired thickness.
My Technique
I boiled the eggs and placed them in an ice bath. I shelled them and placed them, one at a time, on my cutting board (leaving the remaining eggs in the ice bath.) I was hoping the time in the bath--about 15 minutes--would be enough to firm the eggs to aid in slicing.
I drew a sharp, honed blade (6" chef's knife that I use for pretty much all of my prep) across the egg and essentially tried to freehand it. The results were tasty and they were fine for my friends but I would have really liked them to be more uniform.
I did try wiping my blade between slices and this helped a little, but the biggest problem I was having was the change in consistency between the white and the yolk. The knife would hit the yolk and it would sort of drag or turn. I tried a few different grips and I ended up just kind of clawing it.
Alternate Ideas
For next time, I have considered trying to freeze the boiled eggs and letting them thaw slightly before slicing. Something in my gut tells me that frozen hard boiled eggs won't be good eats. It seems like the texture would be changed.
I have read about using dental floss to make a clean cut... but I don't see how that would help here. Is there some magical dental floss technique that I'm just not envisioning?
Some quick Googling also lead me to the idea of wetting my knife or adding oil before each cut. I really feel like the problem is the egg itself and it's awkward shape and consistency. But maybe there's something to this advice after all?
Results
As you can see below, I ended up with some small guys and some fat guys. They were tasty, but I WANT PERFECTION!
Is there any reason you cannot use a purpose-built egg slicer? http://media1.onsugar.com/files/users/1/17470/21_2007/img20l-thumb.jpg
No particular reason apart from not wanting another gadget in the kitchen. #apartmentlivingproblems
Slice them before you boil them. Not sure why you really care, yours look great as they are
@TFD Exactly how is one supposed to slice an uncooked egg? Now THAT would be impressive kitchen technique.
@logophobe with a witty retort, I assume.
Wet, thin blade, like a boning knife. Chef's knife is almost exactly wrong for the job.
@WayfaringStranger Boning knife! That's a great idea. Duh. Thanks, man. I tend to use my chef's knife for almost everything in the kitchen.
I second the dental floss technique. Use plain non-flavoured dental floss, unless you like added flavour on the eggs. Peel the eggs and then wrap the dental floss around the egg, then gently pull the floss till it squeezes the egg in half. Clean/wet/oil the floss and you are good to go to the next one.
Between slices, dip your (very sharp) knife in water. It really does work. You don't want your knife wet enough that it makes your eggs wet, it just lubricates. Also, the eggs should be very cold before slicing. Your finger food looks great BTW.
The proximity of "slice" and "finger" in your post makes me a little nervous. Strange eh? By very cold do you mean I should stick them in the fridge? Any comment on the freezing idea?
20 minutes in the freezer should do no harm and will no doubt make the eggs easier to slice. You don't want to freeze them solid, just firm them up a little. You can do the same thing with bacon or other tricky-to-slice meats.
@PrestonFitzgerald I concur with Eledil, a short time in the freezer helps to slice just about everything. Yankee's solution isn't bad either, if you don't mind buying another gadget. I admit - I have one.
An addendum to @Jolenealaska suggestion - wipe any egg yolk off of the knife before dipping in water as the egg yolk will create (unnecessary) friction.
Egg slicers work very well for this - consistent, thin slices. It's also good for more than just eggs - mushrooms, avocados, mango and strawberries also slice nicely in a well-made model. Avoid the cheap ones - the wires aren't solidly mounted and will break with regular use.
I will occasionally use my egg slicer to slice some strawberries or mushrooms, just so I can say "See? It's not a uni-tasker!" (Note that mushrooms will quickly destroy a cheap egg slicer, so you have to weigh cost vs. being able to say there's only one uni-tasker in the kitchen.)
Yeah, I had an egg slicer that I wanted to find other uses for and tried it on a mushroom. It cut one mushroom nicely, and then fell to bits on the second one, not something I'm going to bother replacing.
Two solutions to consider, either separately or together:
1.) Did you apply a bit of oil to the blade of your knife? That's my go-to.
2.) If you don't have an egg or strawberry slicer, the dollar store generally has onion holders for a buck or less. Use it to hold the egg in place and slice right flush with the tines.
Ok I am clearly confused as to why you wouldn’t just use an egg slicer, one of the smallest gadgets available to have to store. Clearly oiling, wetting using onion cutters are all time wasters. Just get the egg slicer. Also the wire slicers for cutting cheese for deviled eggs, there are fancy ones or the knife shaped ones with triangle shaped holder so you can cut a variety of items. Frankly I find the egg slicer handy as you can slice an egg, turn it the other way any turn again to make easy diced eggs for salads etc. my kids loved eating eggs sliced and less likely to choke. It seems to me you're making life harder instead of paying a few bucks for a cheap slicer.
Debra, welcome to Seasoned Advice! I strongly recommend you take the [tour] and browse through our [help], especially [answer] and even more, the code of conduct. We strive to keep this a friendly environment where everyone is welcome to participate and we accept the specific restrictions without negative comments. Your original post was flagged as unfriendly and a helpful experienced user removed the offending parts. You are welcome to have an own opinion and to disagree with the asker as long as the answer is constructive and positive.
Heya Debra. You're probably right--I've never actually used one of those before and I just wrote them off as low quality gadgets. I'll have to give it a shot. Thanks for the tip.
Try wetting the knife, or use a wire slicer (some plastic tool with steel/nylon wires stretched across an egg shaped indentation). Also, make sure the eggs are hard boiled, and cold.
OP's question clearly outlined their technique (in which your points, or lack thereof rather) were detailed.
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Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.774086
| 2014-06-09T06:20:35 |
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|
115344
|
How to make vivid color candy with a small quantity of natural food coloring?
I use some natural food coloring for candies. The problem is that they are not very intense and that not many vivid natural food colors are available in the market.
I tried powder, liquid and gel coloring: powder and liquid had very dull colors ( I tried several brands and several colors) while on the contrary gel coloring was the only one that gave vivid colors.
The components of the 3 types for coloring are the following:
gel: E422 glycerol or glycerin or glucose syrup + water (optional) + color
liquid: water + color
powder: just color
What I don’t understand is : how come the color intensity changes so much for gel with just this additional ingredient? Did I miss something?
Hi kokoto, we have a rule about asking one question per post. I had to remove a part which would have been a duplicate, see https://cooking.stackexchange.com/questions/7152/i-would-like-to-make-my-own-food-coloring-with-natural-vegetables-what-is-the-t?rq=1. But in general, don't hold your hopes too high.
Reading your question it seems like you believe the 'color' component of the three dyes is the same, and the only difference is the glycerol/glycerine/glucose. I doubt this is the case; the different solvent in place of water almost certainly enables a different dye substance to be used.
The color component is the same, for ex : natural blue for food coloring is only spiruline.
To the question in the title: you can't. Food coloring works just like any other dye or pigment. It consists of tiny colored particles, and the more particles you have in one place, the more intense the color. If you dilute the particles, the color will be pale, no matter what. If you want a certain shade of color, you need the corresponding quantity of particles, and cannot arbitrarily decrease it.
As for the reason for different color intensities with different food coloring products, there are too many possible reasons, both due to technical limitations and marketing decisions.
the different product types can use different colorings
the different product types can use different densities of color particles
the size and structure of the color particles matters. It is normal that a powder will give you a dull color, if it is insoluble - powders generally have low saturation, and transparent crystalline materials are white when powdered (prime example: sugar).
I wouldn't be surprised if color particles suspended in gel droplets can be perceived as more vividly colored, since the gel droplets do have their own optical properties. This is just speculation though, I don't know if it is possible to reliably create a structure in which the color is enhanced, and if yes, if it is being used for such a cheap product as food coloring.
even if it is technically possible to make e.g. a powder with the same coloring result as a gel, the companies might prefer not to, to achieve better market segmentation
So, there are many potential reasons, but the result for you as a baker is the same: the color hue you get is a physical property of the product you pick, and its intensity is a physical property of the amount in which you use it. You cannot magically change that, so you have to determine what gives you the shade you want, and use that.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.774666
| 2021-04-20T20:10:01 |
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|
117472
|
What replacement makes a good training material for shaping Japanese tea-ceremony sweets?
Many Wagashi are made from a mix of rice flour, Shiroan (white bean paste), sugar, and other ingredients. Of those Namagashi are among the most beautiful, shaped as little art pieces and then served in tea ceremony. The right mix can be kind of an art of itself, but I want to try molding and shaping these tiny sweats with material that is more readily available before I start to experiment with making a recipe that I have nothing to compare against due to no shop within 2 hours making them. In a similar circle, I know of no restaurant that actively advertised with them.
What makes a decent substitution that is purely based on moldability and handleability to train to shape Namagashi?
So you want to practice molding it, or are you trying to get a feel for what the right consistency is for when you make it yourself? Why not buy some pre-made wagashi?
Availability prevents me from getting pre-made ones that are not a week old, and it's more the shaping feel I need to get the techniques down - I'm not looking for mochi or similar but for... the style one serves with tea ceremony. Those shaped with sticks and scissors to get flowers or fruit imitates. Namagashi.
Many Namagashi are not able to be stored for more than a few days - and no shop within 2 hours does have them... and I know of no restaurant that serves them within that area too.
Are we talking strictly rice paste namagashi, or other types as well?
@FuzzyChef tea ceremony-style ones. Most of those are apparently riceflour-beanpaste-sugar mix.
Why is making your own dough infeasible? That would give you an inexpensive supply of dough to practice on.
To get white bean paste, I have to order it about a week in advance from my store... the smalltown supply drama. On the other hand, something much more readily available, longer storeable, or possibly reuseable would allow training. A sugar baker I talked to once told me they trained making marzipan items with Fimo-soft
maybe play-dough would be useful to start out with practicing.
You only need rice flour, sugar and water to make a sweetened rice-paste with glutinous rice flour. This and other rice flours are widely available in specialty grocery stores, and surely available for delivery (I live in the middle of nowhere on the Counterweight Continent, so I know what it's like).
At a pinch, you could just pound some cooked rice into a paste yourself - this works fine, but takes a while.
I've not made White Bean Paste, but Red Bean Paste (also used commonly in Wagashi) is just Adzuki Beans boiled in sugar-water until soft, then mixed up to a paste (chunky or smooth are both traditional). It's tremendously easy to make. Any left overs can be frozen - so you could even make this days/weeks before the final Wagashi. If you can't get Adzuki, probably a lot of other bean types would work well enough to practice with.
Why not start out with something simple like Sakura Mochi:
You can pound rice a little, a lot, or use rice-flour. You don't need the pickled Sakura leaves, although I pickled some cherry leaves (simmered in salt water for a bit), since it was the only thing available.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.775045
| 2021-10-10T19:43:48 |
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|
75917
|
How can I get my flavorings to flavor my carnitas all the way through the pork?
So, I've been trying for a while to mimic taqueria carnitas at home with my slow cooker. I initially tried a recipe that had you put some water in and then cook in its own juices, with seasoning; that was good, but it was a bit dry, and the seasoning all stayed on the outside. since there were multiple options for what recipe to use, I asked the folks at the tacqueria I go to which recipe they use, and they said they use oranges and milk. So I tried a couple different recipes with those properties, and they still only flavored the outside. So I tried experiments with submerging it in lard - an experiment each with spices smeared over the meat, then with them mixed into the lard. Still only flavored the outside. I tried using more of the spices; that was good, but it was emphatically not the right thing.
So for comparison, what I'm trying to reproduce - the carnitas from the tacqueria - is pretty subtly flavored, and notably, basically does not taste like pork at all. It pretty much tastes like milk flavored pork. Furthermore, it's super moist all the way through but it's as though it's moist with milk - when you cut into it, the runoff from inside looks like milk mixed with a small amount of pork fat. and it looks grey most of the way through, with only small spots of pink, whereas mine look pink in the middle.
My current hypotheses:
they might be using a pressure cooker or deep fryer rather than a slow cooker
they might be marinating it with milk
they might be adding the milk afterwards
they might be shredding it then cooking it further (seems unlikely, they often give me large chunks)
they might be using better meat (mine is the cheapest pork butt/shoulder I can find)
they might be cooking it in a smaller pot, as described as beneficial on serious eats (but I already tried packing my slow cooker with meat and nothing else and it was exactly the same)
they might be using a completely different spice mix than cumin and oregano (but I can hardly taste any spice in theirs at all, whereas it's always obvious in mine, so they're at least doing something to blend it in better)
they might be using more milk than I am (I'm using a cup for 3lbs to 7lbs of pork, they might be going as far as to submerge it)
they might be using a meat tenderizer
they might be cooking on a much higher heat
they might be using more orange than I'd expect, maybe marinating in orange tenderizes such that milk soaks through?
I don't have any pictures of theirs, unfortunately.
Whatever it is, carnitas typically are pork and should taste like pork. The pork pieces are typically cooked tender and flavorful and then fried. I tend to braise and not fry afterwards. If I do fry, lard is not on the radar. That said, we can't know the specific flavor your restaurant provides and it's very subjective.
yeah I know, and that kind of sucks for asking for suggestions. if you have any thoughts on how to get it to saturate with milk that'd be super cool too though.
One of your possible answers is pretty close to what I think is the correct one. To flavor carnitas all the way through, put them back in the braising liquid that has been reduced since cooking the pork. You can create a kind of glaze out of the braising liquid, and toss the shredded pork in that (defat the braising liquid before reducing it).
BTW, I never fry carnitas. I may throw them on a greased grill, but I never deep or shallow fry them.
Similar to Jolene's answer, this is what I do when I make a shredded beef filling -
The meat is slow-cooked in seasonings, spices and some liquid. The meat is removed and shredded.
The liquid is poured into a container and de-fatted. A set amount of that liquid is put into a blender with some additional spices and seasonings and mixed well. It goes back into the crock pot along with the shredded meat. It's all mixed well and kept hot.
When looking at carnitas recipes for the slow cooker, if you find a method that adds the seasoned cooking liquids back into the post-shredded meat, that's probably your ticket for distributing those flavors more thoroughly.
It is hard to know how does the carnitas tastes in the taqueria you visit, but I live in México, about 15 minutes away from the place the carnitas were created so I can tell you something about how are they made.
You're right about cooking it with lard, that's the original way of doing it. And also about the orange juice.
You need to make a bath for the meat and first you put the lard and the orange juice and some oranges cut in quarters. Then you add very slow and very carefully water and orange soda (yes, you heard that right). like the proportion I could not tell because carnitas are usually prepared in huge quantity but I guess the problem is that carnitas are actually submerged in this boiling preparation of orange, lard and herbs such as laurel and cumin. And this results in very flavour meat and very tender texture. And the type of pork meat used is leg, tenderloin and rib so maybe you could try with them.
I definitely know that there is not milk at all.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.775301
| 2016-11-27T20:40:29 |
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|
125750
|
What do you call the result of passing through a sieve?
Writing down an instruction to add the 'passed ingredient X' to bowl Y, I found the possible referring phrases getting slightly clunky, or else unspecific like 'the result'. With tomatoes it would be Passata. I've seen it called purée, but does that cover high-water sludge too? By analogy I'd like to write 'passée' (with care not to drop that second 'e'...) but that doesn't seem to exist conventionally, so might be jarring to (currently hypothetical) readers.
For an example, I boiled and mashed pumpkin with added water, then I pushed the mass through a sieve until the work got too hard and scraped the sieve bottom into the juice. The results were solid-rich but still thin juice, what I want to name; and a fibery, firm lump, much more of an everyday-language puree than the former. Both 'pumpkin', both used further on.
For another, coarsely cut and crushed tomatoes with diced peppers on top, steamed soft and passed resulted in a blended-soup-like fluid. The sludge I mentioned above, which doesn't seem to sound very culinary, or does it? I actually jotted down 'soup' at first, but there's no soup going into or out of that recipe. Avoiding such confusion prompted this question.
Is there a single word I can use, or several for various cases? In English and also in German, if you're equipped to oblige.
Purée can simply be a sort of finely crushed/blended product, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s been strained / sieved. What you’re calling ‘sludge’ might be considered ‘pulp’ depending on what you’re straining. (True sludge might pass through a sieve, but then settle to the bottom of the liquid, which is why it’s a pain to remote in water treatment)
@Joe, did I seem to you to think puree implied straining?
And I would have thought pulp was the residue?
in your first paragraph, you say that strained tomatoes are passata or purée. So yes. And you mention scraping the sieve and having a fiberous lump … oh, the bottom of the sieve. Okay, that’s not pulp, but I’m still unclear as to what your end result is when you talk about the lump
The lump is the dried pumpkin flesh. About the tomatoes, with respect, you've inverted the logical arrow. I wasn't saying that passata is always strained. Thank you!
If you need to be specific that you're referring to the post-sieving ingredient, I would probably say "the sieved X", or probably clearer and more common, "the strained X" or even "the X liquid" (with the part left in the sieve being "the X solids"). I don't think there's a common noun for "the result of sieving" in English, so in order to be easily understood, you probably have to use more than one word.
You may not always need to be specific, of course. If you pass fruit through a sieve, and then do something else with it later, it's still fruit. It might be a helpful reminder to say "the sieved fruit", but you could likely also accurately refer to it as "fruit" still.
Whether or not "puree" is an appropriate word, or whether there's another appropriate word, really depends on the specifics. Words like that aren't so much defined by whether a sieve was involved as they are by the texture and ingredients.
Your pumpkin sounds like you separated it into juice and pulp, or juice and solids, if you like. Your tomato+pepper sounds like a puree, or if you're really worried it's not thick enough, call it juice, I suppose.
I am aware that if you ask dictionaries you will see purees restricted to thicker liquids, but I have seen it used for things with plenty of water plenty of times in recipes/cookbooks, and "soup-like", especially with tomato, implies the inclusion of plenty of fine solids and at least some thickness. Tomato juice as sold in stores is reasonably thick, though, so whatever floats your boat.
And a final note: the purpose of recipes is, generally, to convey information in a way that's understood by other people. If there is a single word that's abundantly clear and accurate, that's great. But it's very common in recipes to add extra words to be more understandable and/or convey more information. People frequently write things like "thin puree" or "thick juice", and that's a good thing - it lets the reader know that it's actually fine and expected that their juice isn't as thin as apple juice, it helps them confirm that they're adding the right thing in that later step. If your goal is to avoid confusion, clarity should be your primary goal, not single-word.
But would ‘the sieved fruit’ be the liquid that passed through the sieve, or the pulp left behind?
@Joe Sure, it's ambiguous sometimes, so doesn't always work. But there's also cases where there's really not much in the sieve (e.g. a bunch of blackberry seeds).
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.776024
| 2023-11-06T23:23:43 |
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|
126028
|
My pizza dough is too dense
Followed two different pizza dough recipes before even getting to letting them rose I know something was wrong. Felt like too dry, dense and not at all sticky. We used bread flour. Warmed the water for the active dry yeast. The dough rose but still is too dense to spread and does not pass the “window pane test” Any suggestions?
Can you include the recipe and / or a photo?
Also, what sort of pizza are you making (crust thickness in particular) and what temperature do you intend to bake it at?
how much water and flour did the recipe call for? It sounds like it was too dry… which is very tricky to fix after the fact, as you end up just slicking down the outside of the doughball
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.776418
| 2023-12-08T13:44:33 |
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125193
|
Is it ok if there is brine on top of my sauerkraut but not in the middle and bottom portion of my jar while fermenting?
Not my 1st time making sauerkraut but 1st time this seems to happen to me.
In my 2 biggest jars (4l.) I put small glass containers as weight (fit perfectly) and filled my jars quite a bit... so I know that , that is why my brine is spilling out... but my question is ...will it spoil inside my jar if there is no brine in the middle portion? Or not ferment properly? Or as long as it’s sealed on top with brine and weight, it will be okay?!
Thank you so much in advance!
If there’s brine on top, there is definitely brine in the middle and bottom. Gravity sees to that.
It’s likely that during the active fermentation, enough gas has built up in these areas that it looks like no brine is left. If you sharply knock the container against the counter a few times, you’ll see that (some of) the gas is dislodged.
Things are fine. If brine has spilled, once fermentation settles down there may be insufficient brine to cover the top. If this occurs, make up a bit more brine (scale the amount of salt and water in equal proportion) to cover.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.776514
| 2023-09-09T20:02:57 |
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84352
|
Tempered chocolate melting easily
I tempered 70% bitter chocolate (Lubeca brand) following the instructions on the Anova site using sous vide: first to 115 degrees, then 81 and lastly 90 degrees (all Fahrenheit). The resulting chocolate was nicely tempered after cooling in the fridge but it would not hold its shape at room temperature.
How can I correct this?
Do you have a link to the product you're talking about? I'm not familiar with the concept of "butter chocolate". Do you mean white chocolate (chocolate that is only made with the cocoa butter).
It was a type. I meant to write bitter, not butter. Sorry! Thanks :)
One possibly silly question, but I am sitting in a very cold room today after some very hot days: what is your current room-temperature? Chocolate can be SO tricky....
@Layna - can't tell for sure, but I use AC in my house and it's pleaseant for me at least.
In my experience, those temps work for milk chocolate, but not for bitter chocolate. Instead of 115/81/90, give 135/83/90 a shot. That ratio works well for me.
Good luck!
Thanks @ChefAndy. I will give it a try. Quick question though - according to this reference (http://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/1155856) the temperature of the skin is above 90F, which means that by definition, since in 90F we expect the chocolate to be workable (i.e. melted), it will be melted on touch. So how can I work with it after it's set? For example, I want to mold it and then keep working on the molded figure. Do you know?
What do you mean when you say work with it? You mean moving the set pieces around? Waiting until the chocolate is completely cooled, working in a cool environment so the chocolate is cooler and immediately heat up to 90 degrees upon touch, and wearing food service gloves helps a lot to mitigate smudges and finger prints. You can try using cool, dry kitchen towels for moving larger pieces. Overall, you should touch them as little as possible. This is one of the reasons that working with chocolate is challenging.
Working with it meaning moving it around. See this video, minute 13 - https://youtu.be/Unh4iqffJjM if I would have tried to touch the chocolate I had I would have made a hole simply by touching it. But the chocolate in the video seems pretty snap.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.776645
| 2017-09-12T22:12:17 |
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117513
|
Can I substitute ketchup with tomato puree in marinades?
I want to experiment with various marinades the first time, and I've found great recipes but some of them require the use of ketchup.
While it sounds awesome, I find it unhealthy and prefer not to buy ketchup only for the sake or marinades. Can I achieve the same with natural tomato puree? If yes, what other spices should I consider for the same effect?
If the question is vague: I want to cook pork, mostly.
May I ask what recipes suggest marinating pork in ketchup? That sounds very unusual to me.
Instead of making ketchup separately, you can also fold the ketchup ingredients into the marinade recipe because there might be overlap like honey, vinegar, garlic powder, etc.
Ketchup has a very different flavour profile to tomato puree. Ketchup contains tomatoes, but also (from memory and Greg Nickoloff's helpful comment) salt, sugar, vinegar, and flavours like celery, allspice, garlic, onion and tamarind. A recipe that asks for ketchup is likely drawing on all of these to some extent; for example I have seen ketchup in recipes that echo tamarind sauces for stir fries.
By all means experiment with ketchup replacements for your marinades; you could use the list above (or just the ingredients list on a ketchup bottle) as a starting point. 'Healthy' is off-topic here (and pretty meaningless anyway) but assuming that what you're worried about is sugar you may find that with less sugar the end product has less colour and shine as well as tasting different.
Happy marinating!
I concur. A large part of ketchup's flavor is vinegar. I'm not sure about tamarind, but allspice, garlic, onion are easily identifiable in general American ketchup.
Yeah, but if you hate ketchup (raises hand), it being different might not be a bad thing.
@PoloHoleSet if you hate ketchup, then maybe start with a recipe that doesn't have any
@Kat or figure out what in the ketchup causes your dislike and make your own without that ingredient (and possibly use a substitute).
@Kat - There are certain families of recipes that almost always start with it as a base, so then one would look for a less-ketchupy substitute. One that comes to mind would be a BBQ sauce. There's an example of where something vaguely similar, but different, might be a good option.
Good answer, I'd add that the extra acid in the vinegar helps with the marinading too. Sure, tomato by itself can have plenty of acid (depending on variety), but the extra from the vinegar will help.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.776851
| 2021-10-14T21:40:25 |
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|
117631
|
What is the best practice storage method for flour to avoid bugs?
I have recently decided that I'd rather have base ingredients that I am store in my pantry in order to make more meals from scratch as opposed to getting things premade. A friend of mine told me there's no way that they would store flour anywhere but the fridge, otherwise it would eventually get bugs in it.
I have looked around and found these two related questions:
Is it okay to keep flour in the freezer?
What is the best way to store the whole wheat flour for daily usage?
However I don't think that either really addresses specifically the concern of bugs, or the preferred storage location of pantry vs. fridge vs. freezer.
I don't do much baking, but I wouldn't be opposed to starting (provided that my flour doesn't get bugs in it!) For now though, most of my uses of flour would be in small amounts for stovetop recipes and the occasional breading, so I'm not too concerned about my flour not rising properly (mentioned here), or throwing off the baking time because of a temperature difference (mentioned here). Is the fridge enough to stop the bugs? Or is a freezer necessary? Is the container being airtight the only thing that matters?
EDIT: In response to a comment, I am located in Minnesota, in the United States Midwest region.
Where are you based? The prevalence of bugs in houses, and the prevalence of bugs in the flour you buy, is likely to vary by location.
@dbmag9 I am in the United States midwest, Minnesota to be specific
I am not sure what we could add beyond the answers contained in the linked questions. Sealed containers are the best way to avoid bugs. They are either in the flour already (or not), or get in if the container is not sealed.
There's also this question: https://cooking.stackexchange.com/questions/5258/what-to-do-about-beetle-infestation-of-wheat-products-how-do-we-prevent-reinfes but because it's a compound question none of the answers really cover the re-infestation part of that question. So, answering below.
@moscafj I looked at the linked questions, and none of them have answers that particularly address preventing bug infestation, mostly because all three of those questions are primarily asking something else.
I solved this by buying smaller quantities (250g instead of 500g or 1kg). If you have easy access to supermarkets, treat the pantry as a distribution centre, not a warehouse.
@mcalex That gets really expensive here. For example, just quickly looking online, the common brand of flour that I normally get (basic all purpose flour) is currently on sale at my local grocery store so that the 5lb (~2.25kg) bag actually costs slightly less outright than the 2lb (0.9kg) bag. Even at normal prices, the larger bag is 1.5x as expensive as the smaller bag, while having 2.5x as much flour in it. Even though flour is cheap, you can afford some sealing containers pretty quickly at that rate. (And it applies even more to other pantry items, e.g. cereal, sugar.)
@user3067860 Very true, I always prefer buying in bulk for this exact reason. though in my current situation it might not make much of a difference since I'm hardly using much flour in the first place
Based on my personal experience of living in a 100-year-old apartment building, where both pantry moths and flour beetles were basically chronic:
The freezer will prevent bugs more effectively than the fridge, which also works better than the pantry. Particularly, the fridge only keeps bugs from hatching, but the freezer will often kill the eggs. Both the freezer and the fridge (per the other questions) also have the benefit of making whole grains last longer.
However, a lot of us simply don't have the space to put all of our grains and legumes in the fridge or freezer. If you need to put them in the pantry, here's a guide:
Store all grain items, including flour, pasta, crackers, rice, etc., and all dried legumes in airtight thick-walled containers. Glass jars are ideal for this, but heavy hard-walled plastic containers will also work. Plastic bags are insufficient, as flour beetles can tunnel through a freezer bag. Yes, this means removing even new, unopened items from store packaging and putting it into a hard-walled container.
Regularly, at least 3 or 4 times a year, take your whole pantry apart, scrub all surfaces, walls, and cracks, and inspect all containers for infestation. If anything is infested, throw it out outside and clean the container with boiling hot water (or the dishwasher). If you notice moths or beetles, do this cleaning step immediately.
This works because pantry moths, flour beetles, roaches, and other pantry pests come from three sources:
They're already in the product. Bugs often infest grain products in the warehouse or at the store, since they have an effectively infinite food source there. While strong AC at markets will prevent the eggs from hatching, it doesn't kill them and they hatch once you get them into your nice, warm pantry.
They're already in your home. Pantry pests are able to survive on very little food or water and are legendarily difficult to permanently eradicate, since eggs can survive in tiny crevices.
They enter your home from outside in search of food. This is more true of moths and roaches than it is of beetles.
Airtight, thick-walled containers keep pests isolated on either side of the container, so the pests infesting a store product don't get out, and the ones in your home don't get in. The combination of containers and keeping your pantry scrubbed removes temptation for nearby pests, so they don't have a reason to crawl/fly to your pantry in the first place.
So the best way to ensure that there wont be any live bugs in the product at any point in the future would be to first freeze the product (kill the eggs) in an airtight container (no condensation when it thaws) and then make sure that the air tight container remains airtight (keeps new bugs out, so they cant lay eggs) Am I gathering all that correctly?
Correct. https://everythingwhat.com/how-long-do-you-freeze-flour-to-kill-bugs
Aside - you can put store-packaged items inside plastic bins. This lets you keep the different age/best-before/use-by/batch info, and the "contents list" which would be handy if you perhaps need to avoid foods with Soy in them (family example there)
Important: when you clean out your cupboards use a vacuum cleaner on all cracks and gaps.
You can get traps (sticky cards impregnated with bug-friendly scent) to see if the little rascals have come back. Replace regularly.
Of course the implication is that even if you freeze your flour and kill all the eggs - there's still potentially (dead) eggs in your flour. Hopefully that doesn't skeeve you out too much...
@DarrelHoffman As long as they're not wrigglin' and I can't see them, I can tough it out! lol
Daniel: if someone is freaked out by dead bug eggs in flour, I have very bad news for them.
@FuzzyChef "86% of protein in flour comes from dead bug eggs" - Imae Kupkwòt
I'm a bit late to the party, but I personally do this: Buy only enough for you to eat in 2 or 3 days. While this keeps you on the run at some extend because you need to go shopping regulary, this prevents food from infection / spoiling, so you don't waste as much. Also you need little storage and can vary your diet pretty fast. Works best if you live near a supermarket, then you'd not even need a car. For some reason I get the feeling that more people here in Europe are doing this than f.e. in America.
@TCooper Now that's an interesting fact for sure!
@clockw0rk That may work for some food items, but even the smallest bags of flour my local supermarkets sell are way too big for me to go through in 2 or 3 days.
@clockw0rk, I don't remember where I read it, but the more often you go to the store, any store, the more likely you are to splurge on something you wouldn't normally buy, like the stuff the stores put in the checkout aisles. This may not be true for everyone, but it's true for most. Also, most things I buy last far longer than 2-3 days for me. A package of ham will last a week, a half gallon of milk will sour before I've used it, a loaf of bread can last me weeks, and even stuff I use regularly will definitely last around a week, and serving sizes tell me I'm a family of 4.
@TCooper, do you have a source for that? It sounds like something someone made up to scare people into eating gluten free. If there was that many eggs in flour, they would be noticeable by the human eye.
@computercarguy lol double check the name I attributed the quote too. Was a bad joke. I made up the number entirely. I'd guess it actually is material - but I have no idea...
@TCooper, I guess I didn't realize what you did because I didn't understand the name. Even after trying to sound it out over a dozen times, I still don't get the last name.
@computercarguy I-mae K-up-kwòt == I make up quote
If there are no bugs in the flour you buy, then storing it in an airtight container will prevent bugs from getting in. This could be your fridge but could equally well be a large tupperware or similar container. In the UK flour is typically sold in supermarkets in paper bags that range from 500g to 2.5kg; I just leave mine in a cupboard and have no problems, but if I was worried about bugs I would put the whole paper bag into a suitable container for storage. The storage location could also make a difference, for example if it is on a shelf in a clean kitchen versus on the floor of a basement.
If there are already bugs in your flour (my instinct is that this should not be a big concern in Minnesota), then they will still be there no matter the containers, but an airtight container will stop them moving between food items (it probably wouldn't be sufficiently airtight to kill them). In a fridge bugs will be less energetic but will not die from the temperature. I would recommend you sift your flour in this case before using it to remove them and any other impurities.
I think that is the case in most of europe. I honestly was kinda shoked that people dont all store base ingredients in the house. But maybe in midwest USA there are bugs that prevent you from storing your flour in the paperbag or in tupperware and you have to put it in a freezer? Seems like a problem that doesnt occur in europe.
@bibleblade I guess different levels of urbanisation and building materials make a difference; I live in a city in a brick building, which is perhaps very different to a more rural wooden building in terms of friendliness to bugs.
I dont know in my country all houses are built with bricks. And I live in a huge city yes, but in like a 50km circle there is nothing except for some very small villages and some single farms. I know many people living in these villages and everyone just stores flour in a paperbag. And everyone is living in a brick house though. No matter if its a flat or house.
@bibleblade I've lived in Germany and now I live in Austria. Old, urban buildings each time. I've had flour moth infestation in both locations until I started to store my flour in the freezer. So I believe it has little to do with the country you live in, and more with unaccounted factors we don't really know. (Because anecdotes aren't reliable evidence.) It's true that most people just store their dry foods in the packaging they come in, but that doesn't mean it's a great idea.
"So I believe it has little to do with the country you live in" As an Australian who's never heard of these things before, I'm pretty sure it does. Looking it up, it looks like some of the species are present in Australia, but I've never heard of them infesting consumer goods.
@nick012000 that's because all of the many, many spiders in your country eat them first.
My family has lived in Texas since the 1970's, and keeping flour is a problem. We've found the sure thing is to get a container with a spring-clip latch on the lid. These come in large enough sizes to drop a standard 5 pound package of flour into one, so you don't have to pour it out and label the jar. These come in lightweight plastic now.
The container to look for has a metal hinge and buckle mechanism to latch it down tightly, and a washable gasket to form a seal.
Plus, while looking for some containers I'm finding that they have quite a nice aesthetic for the most part. It's a win win!
I am partial to this solution, though its viability is dependent on your circumstances.
I use food grade 5 gallon plastic buckets to store dry goods like flour, sugar, and rice. A bucket like this:
from the Home Depot, along with a plastic lid made to twist off easily like this:
This provides an airtight and watertight storage solution for dry goods, but the aesthetic is not very pleasant, so this solution is best in a situation where you can store the bucket(s) in a pantry or closet out of sight.
These don't take up an insignificant amount of space, so this solution is not the best for those living in smaller apartments without storage.
On the plus side: a 25 lb. bag of flour fills one of these almost exactly, so buying in bulk becomes easier, and the buckets are easily stackable to save space in the pantry if you have multiple dry goods you want to keep on hand. You can find the lids in various colors, so color coding the buckets is easy, too.
These buckets are fairly cheap, too, at least in most of the U.S. Together the two parts above are $17, and can be cheaper if you look for other sources.
In places in the western U.S., I have bought them from WINCO for as little as $9 together.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.777095
| 2021-10-26T17:52:13 |
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23295
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Why are my cheese curds not well-knitted after pressing?
I've made several cheeses at home following a cheddar recipe. After I've aged the cheeses and cut them open, I'm usually finding that the cheese has a somewhat spongy, open texture with small visible holes in it, similar to provolone:
This is in place of the denser, solid texture that I expect from cheddar:
The taste of the cheese is quite good, but I can't figure out why the texture isn't turning out as expected. What am I doing wrong?
i have problems with this, too - i look forward to hearing some ideas. my cheeses are, i suspect, OVER pressed, but the same problem exists for me... the curds are not knitting correctly, and i do not know why.
How long are you aging it? And what bacteria did you use? What do you mean by not well knitted? Is the problem just the holes or when you cut it didn't it separate into distinct curds? You mention a spongy texture but I don't see that from the picture. Your picture actually doesn't look bad at all (except for the few small bubbles)
@Sobachatina, by "well-knitted" I mean that the curds should be completely fused together, and the interior of the cheese should have a single, continuous texture. The "small bubbles" aren't actually bubbles but gaps between the curds that didn't close during pressing, and I don't know why.
Also, neither of these pictures is actually of my cheese, they're just reference pictures I found online.
@JSBᾶngs, Having distinct curds is normal when the curd is first cut and drained. It is during pressing that it solidifies into a homogeneous mass. Perhaps you are not applying enough pressure or your press is trapping in air or whey? I haven't seen this problem so I am reticent to post these suggestions as an authoritative answer.
Several possible reasons...but without seeing the recipe, your make notes, pH markers it is rather hard to say.
However, I would say that most likely would be too much moisture left in curds due to:
initial curds cut too large
too much rennet, meaning that more moisture was locked into the curd, resulting in the cut being made later than it should be (did you use the flocculation method to determine when to cut the curd?)
pH was too high at various periods during your make, resulting in a "sweeter" curd
too much time between addition of rennet and the cut of the curd (see 2...related)
lack of or insufficient cooking of the curds prior to cheddaring, resulting in too much whey (moisture) left in the curds.
insufficient salting
insufficient pressing (unlikely, since the previous 6 control moisture much more than the pressing)
Any, some or all of the above.
Please use toolbar at top of answer box to format and number, you get tidier postings, that way more people can understand them. Also check help on "Markdown" editing
Are you sure your cheddaring process (forming 2 slabs and flipping and stacking them for 2 hours every 15 min) was done at the correct temperature?
Also is it possible that you fractured your curds with rough stirring?
Try more pressure and a bit less salt.
My guess is that less salt will mean more moisture is retained, which might make the curds fuse together more completely.
Why would less salt help? This sounds like the beginning of a very interesting answer, it is frustrating that the body of the answer is missing.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.778262
| 2012-04-24T18:12:33 |
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127792
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Densities of simple syrups?
Can someone help me find values for the densities of simple syrups? Specificually I am looking for values of 66.6 Brix solution (2:1 mass ratio syrup) and 50 Brix solution (1:1 syrup).
I would also very much apprechiate it if you provided values for other brix solutions as well. Maybe there is a graph showing density as a fuction of brix for simple syrups?
One reason why I want to know is so that I can calculate the amount of water and sugar I need to get a certain volume of simple syrup. Here is how: if I have m grams of sugar, w grams of water, the density is D and the volume is V then V×D=m+w. For a 2:1 ratio, we have m=2w (2 times as much sugar as water), so we get: V×D=2w+w=3w. So, to calculate the amount of water we need in the solution, we do: (V×D)/3=w which gives us the amount of water needed. To find the sugar we multiply by 2. Since the density of water is 1g/mL, we can just measure w mL. (In this calculation I have assumed that the mass before and after making the syrup is the same. Although some water may be lost due to boiling, I think this is a reasonable assumption).
Edit: I made 5dL (500mL) of 2:1 (66 brix) solution. Here is how I calculated how much water and sugar I needed: Water: (500mL×1.33g/mL)/3≈222g. Since water has a density of 1g/mL, this is equivalent to 222mL or 2.22dL of water. Sugar: Since the solution is 2:1, we just double the amount of water: 2×221.6666...g=443.333...g≈443g. So, if we mix 443g sugar and 2.22dL of water, we get a simple syrup solution with a (222+443)g/500mL=1.33g/mL density, which has a brix of 66.
By "density", do you mean "specific gravity" or something else?
I mean the weight devided by the volume. But specific gravity is just a ratio of densities, so I can work with that too (often compared to water, which has a density of apporximatley 1kg/L or 1g/mL).
Well, SG is just density expressed in kg/L. Was just checking that you didn't mean "viscosity" or something else.
I'm pretty sure SG is unitless though? Because you take the density and devide by the density of water. If you use kg/L, then the density of water is 1 kg/L and the SG numerical value is equal to the density value. You can, however, use other units and you would still get the same numerical value for SG. https://www.britannica.com/science/specific-gravity
Theoretically, yes, but in practice everyone's comparing against ideal water.
(Hasn't the term ‘specific gravity’ been supplanted by ‘density’? When I learned science in the 1980s, only the latter term was used; I came across the former only in old books and papers. Or does it persist in areas such as cooking and/or other parts of the world?)
@gidds your instructor was an outlier. SG is still used all over science and industry where it is appropriate, all over the world. It's an extremely useful way to measure things like boyancy and the amounts of chemicals dissolved in water.
@FuzzyChef All those things can be still be done with that quantity whatever you call it! I don't know whether it's just because I learned it first, but the term ‘relative density’ simply makes more sense to me than ‘specific gravity’, even though they mean exactly the same. (‘Specific’ is an ironically non-specific term — although it often means ‘per unit mass’, it's sometimes used for ‘per unit volume’, or unit length, or speed, or thrust, or mole, or some other quantity. Whereas ‘density’ is almost always relative to volume.)
The Engineering Toolbox also has tables and graphs for these sorts of things. They have a number of charts depending on which measure of concentration you use, but the weight percentage one in an aqueous solution at 20 C/68 F looks like this:
image source: The Engineering ToolBox (2017). Density of Aqueous Solutions of Organic Substances as Sugars and Alcohols. [online] Available at: https://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/density-aqueous-solution-organic-sugar-alcohol-concentration-d_1954.html Accessed 04 March 2024.
You are looking for the light green line that ends up near a density of 1.45. This chart is for a mass percentage so both solute (sucrose) and solvent (water) have been weighed. The equation is:
(Mass solute / Mass solvent) x 100
Water has a density of 0.99819 grams per cubic centimetre at 20 C, so your density will be slightly off if you are measuring by volume (and can measure that precisely - most people can't without specialized lab equipment), the most precise way to measure would be to weigh out your water and sugar.
For a mass percent of 50 (i.e. 1:1 water to sucrose) the tables below the graphs on the linked page indicate 1.2295 grams per cubic centimetre (cubic centimetre approx = millilitre, as indicated above). For a 70% solution this changes to 1.3472 g/cc. It doesn't supply an exactly 66.6%, but you can extrapolate this from the graph to be around 1.33 (as also indicated in other answers).
Note that sugar has some solute volume; when it is dissolved in water it takes up some room. So, if you took 500 g of sugar and dissolved this in 500 ml of water, you might end up with (made up value) 700 ml of sugar solution. If you are making your solutions by dissolving in a smaller volume and then topping up to your nominal volume (e.g. dissolved 500 g in 300 ml, topped up to 500 for final volume), then your densities will be out by some factor. You could work the density out by converting the mass to molar concentration (molarity) using the following equations and then using the tables and/or graphs on the Engineering toobox linked above:
Number of moles = Mass (grams) / Molar mass (grams per mole)
Concentration (mol/litre) = Number of moles / volume (litres)
Sucrose has a molar mass of 342.30 grams per mole, so for 400 g in 500 ml final volume, you would have (400/342.3) 1.1686 moles in 500 ml (0.5 l) = (1.1686/0.5) = 2.3372 mol/litre. From the mol/litre graph; this would work out to be about 1.29, so somewhere between a 1:1 and a 2:1 solution. You could then take this value back to the weight percentage graph and read off on the percentage axis to get a weigh percentage of 61%.
Here is the first Brix to specific gravity converter I found with a quick Google search. It indicates that 66.6 Brix is a SG of 1.33. I don’t think your way of calculating amounts for sugar syrup is correct —- the density of solutions is more complicated than that —- but that’s how you get density (i.e. specific gravity) from Brix.
Specific gravity and density are two different consepts, although closely related. By density I mean the mass devided by the volume. So if I have a syrup of total mass M and total volume V, then the density D is D=M/V. The specific gravity is the density D devided by the density of some other thing (usually water) and is therefore a unitless quantity.
Yeah I looked up the density of water and it turns out it’s just about “1”. What luck!
Seems like this could be for beer/ wine and not simple syrup? Because of the other ingredients in beer I don't know if this will be accurate... But thanks anyway! : )
No. It’s for sugar in water. The contributions of other substances in wort and must are not significant enough to enter into the calculation. This is how Brix is defined.
Specific gravity is essentially an old term for density. When used these days it's density made dimensionless by normalising to water, but old sources may use the same term to refer to density in imperial units.
And as implied in the answer, while the mass of a solution is equal to the mass of the components, the volume isn't. Anyway defining density for sugar only makes good sense for a single crystal, which you can't buy; densities of sugar as sold are useful but imprecise approximations for those without scales. As the final density depends on the (known) final mass and the (unknown) final volume it's of limited use.
@ChrisH ? I wanted the density of the solution, not the sugar itself. I actually used the formula for calculating how much sugar and water I needed to get 5dL of 2:1 syrup: (1.33g/mL500mL)/3=221.6g of water and 2221.6g=443.0g of sugar (used rounded values). I mixed that and got 5dL. So, the density is: (443+221)g/500mL=1.328. So, it works perfectly fine.
@Vebjorn that works. I was supporting and expanding on "the density of solutions is more complicated than that" in the answer, which would affect plenty of related calculations
In the book Liquid Intellegence by Dave Arnold these values for the two densities are given:
Brix 66: 1.33g/mL
Brix 50: 1.23g/mL
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.778601
| 2024-03-01T21:41:47 |
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126657
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Safe Water Boiled Lentils
What are the guidelines for safe water boiled lentils?
Like the Big Thaw from USDA
Comments removed; see https://cooking.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/3843/did-i-do-what-cascabel-advised-me-to-maybe-i-didnt-understand-correctly-what-d
Such guidelines do not exist.
The FDA (and other agencies with a similar scope of tasks, in the USA and internationally) only create standards and regulations where they see a need for it. Apparently, they have not seen a need to issue a standard for cooking lentils. The most likely reason is that the commonly used ways for cooking lentils (as opposed to the commonly used ways for thawing meat) haven't been sending people to hospitals.
So, it doesn't matter how you cook your lentils. As long as you follow the the other safety guidelines for cooked food (such as refrigerating them afterwards), they are officially considered safe.
As per discussions on comments and meta: This is the answer to the current formulation of the question. It may not say what you wanted to know, but it is the answer to this question, as interpreted by our standards. The question might not cover what you wanted to ask, but I don't see how you can write a different question that is acceptable for our site.
For what it's worth, it's also possible to infer that they regard boiled lentils as sufficiently safe from the fact that there are recipes on the USDA website that simply boil them: https://wicworks.fns.usda.gov/resources/what-do-i-do-lentils They're basically in the same category as government advice for "how do I safely cook pasta".
@Cascabel Boiled lentils are safe. How should I boil them?
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.779216
| 2024-02-13T15:48:19 |
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65134
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Avoiding over-mixing when using a stand mixer
I've been having a problem when I try to make baked desserts using my stand mixer: cookies come out flat and cakes come out too dense. I've tried several recipes and had them come out great when mixing by hand instead, so I'm pretty confident it's not a problem elsewhere. I'm using the slowest setting and running it only as long as necessary.
I don't know baking chemistry that well, but I'm guessing that the power of the mixer is starting the baking soda/powder reaction too early, leaving it without enough reaction left to do its job in the oven. Does that sound right?
Any ideas for how to fix this?
I'd guess it's gluten formation from too much mixing, which is pretty disastrous for cakes.
When I took a cake decorating class, my teacher mentioned that we should double the mixing time for frosting when using a hand mixer instead of a stand mixer. I have no idea if that ratio holds true for baked goods. Unless it's something that requires whipping in air or kneading, I try to just mix it 'til it's combined. (or almost combined, and finish by hand when scraping the sides of the bowl).
Oh ... and how are you measuring your flour? If you're not doing it by weight, that's the most significant variation in trying to follow a recipe.
From your description, that shouldn't be happening. Overmixing is certainly a possibility with a stand mixer, but you really need to do a lot of it to make a real difference. "slowest setting and only as long as necessary" shouldn't produce it at all. Are you sure there aren't other variables you are overlooking?
It could be a lot of things. Cookies in a stand mixer can suffer from gluten production and there would be no really good way to reverse this effect. However, if you are not mixing the cookies for more than a couple minutes, this is not likely the issue. Other things can effect the texture of cookies that might be a byproduct and not a direct result of the stand mixer.
One example might be that the solid fat that is used in the recipe was over mixed or out too long. Soft fat will make a denser crisper cookie. Refrigerating the cookies for a while would help fix this issue.
Another cause could be a minor substitution. See the blog link below for how different substitutions affect a cookie recipe.
http://www.handletheheat.com/the-ultimate-guide-to-chocolate-chip-cookies/
Along with the above make sure to check things like the expiration date on your baking powder. They lose potency pretty quickly after expiration. This could also cause dense cookies.
Another cause can be old baking powder or baking soda. They lose the best performance after 3 months of opening.
That blog link is great. I think at least part of the problem is somewhat old baking soda.
Because you say the recipes work fine when you hand mix them, I'll assume that your issue isn't aging ingredients or substitutions.
Honestly, I'd say that running it on the slowest speed is probably part of the problem. A higher speed for a shorter period of time is probably going to incorporate ingredients better because they get thrown about more.
With my Kitchen Aid, I generally start cookies by creaming the butter and sugar together on medium-medium high (6-8) for 2 minutes. Then adding the eggs and liquid flavorings (vanilla, almond extract, etc) and beating until combined.
In a separate bowl, I will have combined all of the "dry" ingredients (flour, leaveners, salt) by whisking them together to aerate the flour and mix them (I rarely sift flour).
When the wet ingredients are ready, I dump in the dry ingredients and start the mixer on "stir" to keep the flour from flying out of the mixer and, when mostly incorporated (10-15 seconds), I'll bump it up to medium low (4) to fully combine (20 seconds). If there are other ingredients like chips or nuts, those will get a quick stir in at the very end (5 seconds or less) with a last turn with a spatula to make sure everything is incorporated.
Using this method, I've never had an issue with tough cookies.
Cakes are more difficult to explain because there are vastly different methods but I'd encourage you to try a higher speed, shorter duration mix in of your dry ingredients.
One technique you can use to minimize the amount of mixing needed is to put all the dry ingredients in the mixer and let them break up and blend before and liquids are added.
Separately in a bowl, scramble or stir you eggs and mix any other liquids together. While the mixer is running, pour the liquid ingredients in and use a spatula to keep the dough from creeping up the sides of the bowl.
If you get dry crumbs at the bottom of the mixer and need to mix more, then it really means you need to tune your mixer so that the mixing attachment is closer to the bottom of the bowl. A properly tuned mixer should push a US dime (ten cent piece) around then bowl a little bit at a time. This assures that the ingredients at the bottom of the bowl are being mixed and picked up by the wet dough.
for a light and fluffy cake, i mix all ingredients in my stand mixer slowly and thoroughly, pushing down the sides with a rubber spatula until everything is wet. then i mix on high for a few minutes, imparting air to the batter for a taller, lighter cake. works for me.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.779391
| 2016-01-07T04:43:24 |
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67840
|
Alternate seafood for etouffee
Last week I made etouffee for the first time, and it came out pretty good. Unable to find crawfish or raw shrimp, I used pre-cooked cocktail shrimp, which worked but was a little bland (and the double cooking made them a tad chewy).
I'd like to take a second stab at the recipe, and I'm thinking that I want to try something other than shrimp/crawfish, both due to the availability issues and because it's a lot of extra work. Would scallops work? Or some kind of whitefish?
You do know that scallops are shellfish, right?
You know what I mean... but fine, edited.
Shellfish is expected in etouffee, most commonly shrimp or crawfish. Crab meat is another option. Without shellfish it kind of isn't etouffee anymore, but it can still be great and you can still call it etouffee if you want!
For example, here's a recipe for chicken etouffee.
Where do you live that you can't find raw shrimp? I admire your gumption trying to make it with cooked shrimp, but I'm not surprised that it turned out bland and rubbery. Your best bet for raw shrimp is to look for it frozen. Many places will carry raw shrimp individually-quick-frozen and easy-peel, which means that the shrimp are already deveined, and since the shells are already cut down the back, they just pull off. An advantage of buying shrimp this way is that you can simmer the shells for a few minutes and get a nice shrimp broth to use in the etouffee sauce. Most markets that sell raw shrimp at the seafood counter are selling frozen shrimp that they have defrosted, so buying it frozen is actually a better option for freshness.
Since the seafood in etouffee is generally added last and just cooked through, you can really use whatever protein you want. Certainly whitefish would work, so would scallops. I once had a great lobster etouffee. Another great option would be to use andouille or kielbasa sausage with or without seafood too.
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.779846
| 2016-03-29T01:01:15 |
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|
65168
|
Soup 'fork' source
So, this is more a question about food etiquette/trivia than cooking, but this community seemed to be the closest fit.
Is there a specialized fork-like utensil that was used for soup in western high-society scenarios, or are you aware of a fictional source which may have made that claim (like in a joke about obscure dining etiquette)?
I know that I have not encountered this device personally, but I do know that I obtained this idea from visual media, like a show or movie, but I can't remember if it was fictional or not.
Associations I am making with this memory are, these may or may not be accurate:
For a specific or tight category of soups (I want to say Consomme or another empty broth); the utensil appeared non-standard is some way, less strong is why I thought so, I want to say it had only a couple of tines &/or was very slender?; the utensil had a specific name that implied a unique utensil not a fork/spoon variant; it was used by the person eating the soup, not for serving or preparation, but I feel like I remember its use not being straight forward, like maybe to stir the broth before drinking?; I don't believe I saw anyone actually use it, but rather a discussion about using it, like you may see on a travel/restaurant show.
The only thing I have been able to find over many searches are a couple of references of 'Vichyssoise Fork' which both absolutely lacked informative context (a screen name and a picture with a high society cat saying you must use the V.F.). That term doesn't feel right/jog memory, but maybe if I knew more about it it would. I know Vichyssoise is not a broth, debatable origin, I am not finding any references to people using a unique utensil for it, and I feel that the mention I encountered was highlighted because of the difficulty of using it with the intended dish if used improperly/ignorantly.
Thank you, apologies for obscurity/lack of known factors.
Is it possible that it was for aspic? Aspic server #3 http://www.replacements.com/piecetype/flat3.htm
Etiquette differs from culture to culture, country to country and even region to region. Whatever is considered good etiquette in one culture is extremely rude in another, and the same goes for utensils. Which etiquette are you referring to? (as your profile doesn't mention any cultural background)
If it exists you can bet its Victorian, almost everything had its own cutlery, the marrow scoop, the sardine server, the bacon fork and a whole set of different cheese implements. I did check the list of cutlery held by the V&A museum in London and they don't have one.
To be honest, this is a perfect description of a spork. Though a spork is all but a fine cuisine utensil, but a piece of outdoor equipment. On the other hand: I prepare dishes with my bushcraft knife... ;)
Thank you all, these are great, it was answered, but it does sound like something that would be used for aspic, it is essentially based on Victorian culture albeit via comedic exaggeration (which I had failed to mention the possible backgrounds where I was bouncing between victorian/french), and my description does sound kind of like a spork, these all could have potentially led to a valid answer if it wasn't from a comedy skit. Thank you.
You may be thinking of a sketch from the comedy show "That Mitchell and Webb Look" in which a snobby waiter insists that a fork be used to eat soup:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSj5stmFkQ0
Yes, thank you very much, seeing the clip jogged my memory, this is absolutely the source for my thoughts. Also, the clip explicitly cites both Consomme and Vichyssoise Fork explaining why both those thoughts are there. This is much appreciated, glad to know that is just sourced in hyperbolic comedy!
Do you have another link. That one says "Video Not Available"?
@bob A bit late, but I've edited the answer with a correct link. It needs to be approved, so until then it's also here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSj5stmFkQ0.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.780142
| 2016-01-07T22:41:21 |
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|
66438
|
Restaurant: How long can prepped food (cut vegetables, garnishes, etc) be stored before it has to be thrown out?
I am interested to find out if line cooks or prep cooks will prep more than what is needed in a given day for a restaurant, and then just keep the extras in the fridge? Or is food prepped and used or tossed every day?
Are you strictly interested in restaurant policies? Your question title is much more generic. If you want the question to focus on the policy in a restaurant, you should include that in the title. We have a general answer about the food safety part of it but what a restaurant does may be more strict than the food safety rules.
This question is the one I mention, though it doesn't relate to "prepped" food specifically. It does have the general rules for popular fruits and vegetables.
Thanks for that link, it is helpful. However, what I am asking is essentially, "what happens to prepped food (such as diced onion or carrot) in a restaurant if it doesn't get used by the end of the night?"
You can refer this link as well
Many chefs and restaurants follow food storage guidelines obsessively, at least in part because they're required to. Using ingredients that have been stored longer than considered safe can result in customers getting sick, in which case they probably won't return, they'll tell their friends or use social media to spread the word, and they may take legal action if they got really sick. If a health inspector catches such violations, they won't be happy either, and they have a number of potential penalties to impose.
Food cost is on par with labor as being one of the largest costs of running a food service business. I've always heard the "rule of thirds" as a guideline for operating costs in a restaurant setting: 1/3 food cost, 1/3 labor cost, and 1/3 profit (which is not always pure profit and may involve reinvesting back to the business). Industry benchmarks bear this out as well.
My point with all of this is that chefs have two strong, competing incentives:
Do not waste food, because it's expensive in the short term!
Do not serve bad or spoiled food, because it's expensive in the long term!
Obviously there are bad chefs out there who simply don't care. They may not be invested in the business, poorly trained, or just checked out. And many of us have seen reality TV exposes that show how awful some kitchens are.
But, the good chefs that I've worked for and with have a couple different approaches to using up prepped ingredients and avoid throwing things out:
Good labeling and storage. This is really fundamental anyway if you want to ensure that you know how old everything is. Some ingredients (blanched or hearty vegetables) will easily keep for a day or two after being prepped if they're kept cold. All you need do is store them correctly (which depends on the exact food) and use some easy, reliable labeling system to keep things straight in the fridge.
Recycle them into a different dish tomorrow. Lots of restaurants have specials or rotating items. If I shelled a bunch of beautiful fresh peas for a risotto on the dinner menu and I simply don't sell many, I can turn the extra peas into a delicious soup tomorrow. If I'm smart, I'll also use up some of the ham that I diced for a different dish, and the vegetable stock that I use everywhere and have to make more of anyway. On which note:
Turn them into basic or pantry ingredients. Some chefs are really good at this. There are certain things that you can use everywhere: stocks, breadcrumbs, etc. And they aren't necessarily picky about their base ingredients being in prime quality. I might make vegetable stock every couple of days using whatever pre-prepped vegetables I've got on hand, supplemented as needed with fresh (also an excellent way to use up odds and ends that can't be served on their own, like celery stalk bottoms). I might take a surplus of julienned carrots that would have been garnish and pickle them for later use. I could take fresh herbs that are starting to wilt and use those in a marinade for meat. This is a really defining quality for a great chef for me: cleverness with a broad range of ingredients and preparations, and a willingness to experiment. After all, if those pickled carrots don't work out, I would have had to throw them anyway.
Compost them. Not feasible for everybody, but growing their own food is something of a trend and obsession for certain chefs. Rather than having things go to waste I can do what a smart home gardener would, and turn my sad wilted vegetables into healthy compost for my rooftop herb garden.
Most chefs who do these sort of things are also very good about monitoring how much they sell and doing their best not to order or prep more than they need, so they don't have tons of waste in the first place. Chefs who aren't as passionate simply wind up throwing more out. This leads to the curious assertion (but I've seen it quoted from Gordon Ramsay as well) that you can learn a lot about a chef by going out back and checking the dumpster.
Oh, and since your question asks specifically about line and prep cooks: ideally, they are doing exactly what the head chef tells them to. That's basic kitchen discipline. If they go off on their own and prep three times more potatoes than they were told to, they won't be prepping potatoes or anything else for too much longer.
more on composting: which foods to throw, includes coffee, paper, and no odor (or even a fresh dirt type).
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.780504
| 2016-02-12T04:28:52 |
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|
79561
|
Is my microwave oven safe to operate?
In the middle of the oven, situated opposite the microwave source and below the carousel plate a two inch hole has developed over time. It is found rusted. Presently, when it runs I leave the kitchen after switching it on as a safety measure. Is it safe to operate it? Can it be repaired? If so, how?
EDIT: The rusted floor (of SAMAR Panasonic) is shown, glass carousel plate removed exposing the hole beneath. Thanks for any suggestions.
Why do you leave the kitchen?
(Excessive) precaution to avoid any microwaves if reflecting through the hole !
This should really be flagged. This is super dangerous, please check out the un-edited version of this question. To the OP. Throw this item away or take it to a competent, qualified engineer, who I dare say will say. THROW IT AWAY. Do not switch it on.
@dougal3.0.0 I believe "flagging" is used when an inappropriate question needs moderator attention for serious problems. This seems like a legitimate question about kitchen equipment. You answered it pretty clearly.
With the proliferation of lawsuits I would have thought that staying away from answering a question like this should tell anyone to run away. This is a dangerous situation in anyone's book, thus should be flagged for this reason.
This looks totally shot. LITERALLY.
The oven has since been junked.
Noooo! You could have placed it on a higher shelf and cook inside it AND under it. You just needed to place your food carefully! Get it back!!! :-)
Thank you.Shall pass on your suggestion to the possible recipient.
No. Depends upon the construction of the microwave. I spoke to an electrical/electronics engineer with over 40 years experience and he said. NO NO NO. Replace it straight away. It could be safe, however without it being in front of him he does not know.
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.780958
| 2017-04-01T06:31:41 |
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|
67336
|
Why are berries so expensive?
I am trying to eat healthier with less processed foods and I'm a pretty smart guy to begin with. But I can't figure this out for the life of me - why are berries so expensive? I love things like boysenberries and blueberries but I almost choke when I see their price in the store. Why are berries expensive?
At this time of year, most berries are flown in from South America, as it's the wrong time of year to grow things outside in the northern hemisphere. Although a lot of produce is grown in California due to its longer growing season, there are still times of the year when even they can't produce vast quantities (and greenhouses increase the costs)
related : http://cooking.stackexchange.com/q/65871/67 (regarding the costs in growing & picking grapes)
While I agree that "expensive" is open to interpretation, I don't think that most would disagree that berries generally cost more than say apples or bananas or oranges. I believe that there is certainly a place for fact-based answers that are not subjective... as the answers we have show. I don't believe there is a reason to close this as "primarily opinion based".
40 cents for a pound of bananas vs $3 for a 6 oz container of berries. ($8/lb). Crazy, I agree.
@JoeTaxpayer : unfair comparison -- bananas can be shipped green (less damage / loss in shipping, can be shipped through slower means). And they aren't nearly so labor intensive to pick.
@Joe but that's exactly the point... And, I suppose if you want to get technical, a banana is a berry... While (botanically speaking) strawberries and raspberries are not.
@Catija, a botanical "berry" has nothing to do with a culinary "berry".
the Joe that mentioned the botanical vs. culinary 'berry' is not the same Joe that mentioned foreign produce & shipping.
Nitpick - do you want foods that have had less processing (but some is still okay), or fewer total processed foods? The word changes the meaning, hence asking.
As several answers have shown, it is a combination of things. This is reflected in the cost of frozen berries, which are still not cheap, but a lot more affordable. Frozen berries do not have the shipping and storage problem as fresh ones do, but only the picking cost, which is still a bit higher than other fruits, it seems.
It is a combination of many factors. To sell you one perfect apple, one perfect bunch of bananas, or one perfect half-pint of berries requires:
the land to grow on
workers to plant, tend, weed, and pick
transportation to market
loss allowance for fruit that's bruised or spoils in transit
loss allowance for fruit that spoils while at the store and people won't buy it
Many of these factors are objectively higher for berries than for applies or bananas, especially given their short shelf life and tendency to bruise.
This puts a floor on the price growers and stores can charge. Then on top of that, they are delicious and healthy, so at least some people will pay that price. This removes downward pressure to sell them at a loss to get you in the store.
A better question is what can you do about it? The answer is generally to use frozen berries (they don't incur the spoiling and bruising losses) or to eat berries only when they're in season locally and eat other kinds of fruit the rest of the year.
Another option worth mentioning is going to a local farm and picking yourself. Around here we can pick for around 20% of the supermarket sale price
Blueberry bushes grow well in pots, so they're ideal fruit to grow even with next to no outdoor space. The season can be a few months with a mixture of varieties and they grow in a wide range of climates.
@casey Sure, that probably saves a little money but even saving 80% of a few dollars is a small saving compared to the investment of time.
@casey That's provided you have a local farm growing them. We don't. We have greenhouses, but they usually don't allow visitors picking them.
There's a variety of reasons I can imagine:
They're more delicate than most other fruits, so shipping without damaging is harder. Loss due to crushing is expected.
They go bad quickly, which can limit the area they can be delivered to and the method of delivery (planes are more expensive than trucks) but also gives them significantly shorter shelf life in the stores - meaning stores have to charge extra for what they sell because they have to discard anything that starts to rot.
They're more difficult to pick because they're tiny and (often) protected by thorns, so the cost to produce is higher.
They're in additional packaging... apples are loose in giant boxes, berries are usually in small plastic containers that add cost to the overhead.
Think of it the other way around. I got the answer by asking why are bananas so cheap. I live in Michigan, and bananas, even though they have to be shipped from points far south of here, are cheaper than non-cull apples which can be grown locally. The reason (if you remember the Banana Boat Song by Harry Belafonte) is that bananas grow in 6, 7, and 8 foot bunches, meaning that they can be harvested very quickly without a lot of labor. Apples have to be picked one at a time. You will also notice that strawberries are cheaper than any other kind of berry. This is because they are bigger, and therefore take less labor to pick the same quantity. Potatoes and wheat are harvested by machine and therefore cost even less
Referencing facts would vastly improve your answer (or other experts). Berries are expensive due to a number of factors, including cost of production, cost of transport, and short lifetime and season.
Another answer perhaps overlooked is that they are smaller than fruit Irregardless of cost of production, shipping and storing, a small box of berries with 30 berries in it seems like more value than an single apple, even though they have the same weight.
Likewise, the way they are used affects how much people will pay; They are often used more as garnish and decoration. A small box of raspberries can be enough to spruce up a dessert, whereas fruit often needs to be a bigger ingredient.
Can you support the use statement with facts? People regularly make smoothies with berries, if not entire desserts like cobblers and pie. I'd argue that the reason you often find berries only used as garnish is because they are expensive, not the other way around.
I think berries are getting more and more expensive because it takes tons of water to grow berries and slowly we are losing water on this planet so it costs more to water them. also if you are buying organic ones from a local farmer that is amazing but is probably more expensive because its organic so they rot faster because there is no pesticides witch is great! i do know that it is possible to buy cheap healthy food you just have to do a little researching at stores near you and maybe if you are up for it you could start a little garden in your yard.
Lack of pesticides causes them to rot faster? I could see losing a higher percentage to diseases, maybe less production due to different fertilizers or alternate varietals, and higher labor costs for increased monitoring ... but rot 'faster' seems strange.
|
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.781157
| 2016-03-11T17:23:45 |
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100433
|
how to get maximum amount of rise for shaped pizza
I'm making pizza from scratch. My goal is to have the least dough possible in terms of grams per square cm/in, but have it as fluffy and bubbly and airy as possible.
My dough is 360g Caputo blue-sack Tipo-00 fine-ground bread flour, 70% hydration (251g bottled water), 6g yeast, 3g salt. (I add a scattering of margerita salt on the bottom when rolling so cut this down.) 10g sunflower oil seems to improve it.
I dissolve the yeast in hot water (as hot as I can bear my finger in) while mixing the salt with the flour.
Knead 10 minutes, folding in half from 12 o'clock, 3, 6, and 9 in a cycle.
Divide into 123g balls (that fit our little baking sheets). Fold each ball in half 4 times (it resists the fifth fold). Let relax for 40 minutes. (Otherwise, when I shape it to the pan, it will contract.)
Then I roll out to the size of the pizza pan, and stretch it to fit perfectly. (I've hand-stretched instead of rolling and not gotten improved results. Indeed, the thickness is slightly uneven and the thinner spots simply don't get any rise at all. Rolling is much superior as even the thinnest parts are thick enough to rise. Yes this might squeeze out some CO2 from the 30-40 minute relax period, but it's going to go on rising for several more hours. In practice the rolled pizza doesn't end up less tall than the hand-shaped pizza's tallest points.)
Now the question is coming! I leave these sit for 3-6 hours and rise. The baking sheet has a 1cm vertical edge, taller than I expect the pizza to rise, so I just put a cutting board on top to keep it from drying out. I'm getting very variable results, in part because I'm letting them sit outside in Tokyo's summer weather which itself is variable. I know I could check it every 20 minutes or make a time-lapse video, but can anyone describe generally what I should expect to happen? For instance will it keep getting taller, or will the air go out of it at some point, or what? Is 35C/95F a better temp than 23C/75F inside? how long should a dough 2-3mm thick take to rise? Sometimes it almost looks like a mattress, nearly uniformly as tall as the sides of the pan, and gives great results. But I can't recall the conditions I got that effect with.
Just in case it's relevant: I then par-bake in the baking sheet in a toaster oven 4:30; put on the toppings; and give a real bake of 6:00 or so. The toaster oven actually does a much better job than the full-size oven in my last flat did at a nominal 250C/480F, which required a 10 min parbake and 10 min bake. (At the moment we don't have an oven.)
covered with a cutting board: what kind of cutting board is that? is it a curved cutting board or does it flatten the dough entirely? And sitting outside you mean outside of the fridge or outside of the house?
Which style of pizza are you trying to emulate? Regardless of style, I would avoid rolling, as you are likely pressing out a lot of the trapped CO2.
Unless you are getting a strong whiff of chlorine when you get water out of the tap at your house, skip the bottled water and save some money. I've been making all kinds of bread and pizza for a decade or so using tap water alone.
"covered with a cutting board: what kind of cutting board is that? is it a curved cutting board or does it flatten the dough entirely?" Sorry! My baking sheet has an edge taller than the pizza is likely to rise. The baking sheet simply keeps the air from drying the top of the pizza. I'll clarify that.
" And sitting outside you mean outside of the fridge or outside of the house?" Outside the house, on the balcony.
"Which style of pizza are you trying to emulate?" My own style, as stated in the first sentence of my posted question. I can't think how to be any more clear than that.
"skip the bottled water and save some money" To be clear, the tap water isn't great here, so we filter with a Brita filter. We keep the filtered water in the refrigerator so it's typically cold when I'm making dough, and I can use it as such or microwave it.
"Regardless of style, I would avoid rolling, as you are likely pressing out a lot of the trapped CO2" The only CO2 is from 30-40 minutes of relaxation time. I'll grant there's some, but as I tried to explain in the question, shaping by hand leaves some parts just a bit too thin to build up any bubbles at all. My question should be clear that I've TRIED hand, and I've TRIED rolling, and the rolling is absolutely superior. But more specifically to your point, it lacks the parts that are too thin to rise, while the rest rises as much as hand-shaped.
It's not a direct answer to your question, but to really get maximum crust rise you need a real 375C-475C pizza oven, whether electric, gas, or wood-fired. Given the amount of care you take with your dough, you really deserve one. There are portable models that can be used in an apartment.
A brita filter won't filter out chlorine from the water, which interferes with yeast development. Try distilled water.
I think Brita filters do filter out chlorine. Distilled water isn't readily available but cheap bottled water is common in Japan--two liters for like US$0.80 or so. I often use that.
I've gotten the biggest improvement to my pizza by far from getting a hotter oven. I modified a cheap €30 "pizza oven" that only went to 250C by adding insulation around the hot box and a steel plate on the top and bottom heating rods to spread the heat. Then I took out the original thermostat and replaced it with a digital sensor and a microcontroller aimed at 400C (since that's as high as cheap digital sensors are still accurate at), the modifications cost less than €10. Regardless how you make it, the difference between baking pizza at 250C and 400C is night and day.
The pizzas I make have a resting time to improve flavor in the refrigerator. I then take the balls out and, after warming up, stretch them to the appropriate size and add the sauce and all the toppings. It immediately goes into the oven. It rises and puffs up in the oven due to oven spring.
If you let it rise beforehand, I would think the added toppings would collapse the dough. Also, if it rises before putting in the oven, there may not be enough left to have an additional rise so don't do that and see what happens. Just put it in the oven right after stretching and topping.
"If you let it rise beforehand, I would think the added toppings would collapse the dough"--I may not have been clear about this, but I par-bake the naked crust, such that it's gotten its oven spring and become hard even if still under-cooked.
"The pizzas I make have a resting time to improve flavor in the refrigerator" I've done two-day dough for years. Only in the last few months did I realize I could get an excellent smell and taste this way too. I'd like to combine the two: 2-day fridge then my relax-shape-rise-in-the-summer-heat method.
I just want to address this comment about yeast handling:
I dissolve the yeast in hot water (as hot as I can bear my finger in) while mixing the salt with the flour.
Obviously it depends on the finger & temperature, but temperatures over 60℃ / 140°F kills most yeast. For me, "water as hot as I can bear" is about 60℃. So it's possible that the process is killing a lot of the yeast. And sure, some yeast will survive, but it's a sub-optimal process.
Everything I've ever read (but mostly related to yeast handling for brewing) instructs one to use only warm water. Thus I would endeavour to keep the water below 35℃ / 95°F .
Ref: https://www.chefsresource.com/faq/what-temperature-kills-bread-yeast/
Some answers to your direct questions:
I know I could check it every 20 minutes or make a time-lapse video,
but can anyone describe generally what I should expect to happen? For
instance will it keep getting taller, or will the air go out of it at
some point, or what?
A yeasted dough will rise until one of two things happen: (1) the air bubbles in it get large enough to rupture, or (2) the yeast runs out of sugar/starch to eat and dies off. At either point, the dough will collapse back, although it will still be taller than it was when rolled out. If you let the dough exhaust itself like this, you will also lose the rise from "oven spring".
Is 35C/95F a better temp than 23C/75F inside?
The dough will rise faster at 35C than it will at 23C, likely a lot faster. Given that your desire is to have maximum loft, that's probably not good; catching the dough at its maximum rise point before it blows out would involve much more careful timing.
This article discusses both the effect of temperature on rising time and the problems of overproofing.
how long should a dough 2-3mm thick take to rise?
That's harder to answer, because your whole rising cycle is unorthodox and I don't have any experience with one like it. Normally with pizza dough you give it a short to medium rise (30 to 90 min) as one big ball of dough, or even an overnight cold rise. The rise after rolling it out is generally very short, like 10 to 20 minutes; it's not the main rise and is more about relaxing the dough than rising.
Even my standard foccacia recipe, which is more like what you're making, has its main rise at the ball stage and only a 30min rise in the pan.
I will point out that your entire cycle is completely different from what Neapolitan pizza makers do to get maximum crust puff. While individual recipes vary, the general formula is a long, cold rise (like 24 hours) in the ball stage with a tiny amount of yeast (or sometimes none at all), followed by very rapid stretching and dough prep and then 60 to 150 seconds in a very hot (375C+) oven. This results in a crust that can puff up to 4cm from an original 4-5mm thickness. The idea is to maximize oven spring instead of trying to get loft via proofing.
"your entire cycle is completely different from what Neapolitan pizza makers do" Sure: I'm not trying to make a Neapolitan pizza here. I'm trying to make something new. Probably closer to "world's thinnest foccacia" than a Neapolitan. I don't just want a bubbly cornichon, I want the whole thing to be bubbles: a nearly weightless mattress of solid fluff with a bit of a crunch to it.
Sure. I still think it might be worth trying for the "maximum oven spring" approach instead of "maximum rise", with a long slow rise instead of a short fast one, which is why Neapolitan pizza is relevant.
In general - l have made a yeast starter with flour/water/sugar and yeast - l mature that in my fridge for two or three days then use the mix starter with the rest of the ingredients. I have also found to get to get the best end results the oven temperature needs to be very high to shock the dough into rising quickly - l personally have only achieved good results in a pizza oven.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.781761
| 2019-07-29T08:08:27 |
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|
78599
|
What sauce is Gordon Ramsey using for this dish?
Gordon Ramsay has a trailer on YouTube for his MasterClass course. The link for the video is here: Gordon Ramsay's MasterClass (YouTube).
I have attached the screenshot at 0:21
It looks like cream or something else - is that beef wellington too? What is that sauce as I wish to make this dish!
Thanks
that is not a beef Wellington, as it's not wrapped in puff pastry
I agree with @Luciano, it's just a fillet steak. I think the 'sauce' is actually pommes puree, essentially a very buttery, very smooth mashed potato.
Very, very, very buttery, typically 50-50 potato to butter mix believe it or not. Delicious but you can feel your arteries harden after eating it.
Thank you everyone - Please provide answers since cannot reward comments
And, as others have correctly answered, here is the pomme purée version that Gordon Ramsay serves in his restaurants.
The sauce in question here is pomme purée. This was answered by the community but a special thanks to @Luciano, @ElendilTheTall, @GdD and @Dorothy.
Happy Cooking
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.782877
| 2017-02-21T10:00:39 |
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|
66306
|
How are Belgian fries different than the average French fries found in North America?
How do Belgian fries differ from the French fries we are accustomed to eat in the US and Canada in such places as McDonald's, Wendy's, Burger King and so on? Is it the variety of potato, the preparation involved or something totally different? What oil do they use in Belgium?
I remember having them while I was visiting family in Belgium. The fries were somewhat crispy and thicker than over here.
All of the sources I read say the same thing... what makes them different is that they're fried twice.
From Saveur:
Frites are the supercharged cousin to paltry American-style fries: made from soft Belgian potatoes called bintjes, they're thick-cut and—this is key—double-fried (in the olden days, in molten horse or ox fat, though modern options range from lard to vegetable oil). Served in a paper cone with mayo and ketchup, properly executed frites—the ones that have been fried, dried, then carefully fried again—are an addictive riot of textures: soft and fluffy on the inside, surrounded by a crunchy, greaseless crust, dipped in luxuriously flavorful sauces.
From Epicurious:
There is no fancy skill involved in making these crispy fries, but there is a trick. The potatoes are fried twice. The first time cooks them through and makes them tender. The second time, which can be done hours later just before serving, turns them golden brown and deliciously crisp.
From a site dedicated to the Belgian Fry:
So high time time for a (simple) definition of what makes fries Belgian Fries:
freshly cut, irregularly shaped
cooked (fried) twice
fluffy on the inside, crispy on the outside
a distinct potato taste
at least 10 mm thick
preferably served in a paper cone
Some sites mention the importance of certain fats or types of potato but the one similarity for all sites is the fact that they're double fried.
Indeed. Thicker (crunchy on the outside, mushy on the inside), and double fried. First time at somewhere between 150 - 170C (I've heard some people go as low as 140C), but at a lower temperature than the 2nd time in any case, which would be around 180 - 190C. The potato mentioned by Saveur is actually a Dutch potato
There are places where restaurant-grade fries are NOT double fried?
An exceptionally rare downvote from me, because this answer is definitively wrong. As a previous comment notes, most decent restaurant fries are double-fried. Even McDonalds are double-fried (as Kenji's research has shown). Perhaps there's something more specific about the double-frying technique employed in Belgian fries (I don't actually know), but it's certainly not a distinguishing characteristic.
@Catija: Respectfully, I find your comment surprising and incredibly confusing. First, I don't actually know what the correct answer is, and I haven't done the research to find one, so I can't write a correct one. Second, I did in fact offer a "trouble spot," i.e., your answer has provided good sources, but it claims a single primary distinguishing characteristic that is actually shared by a huge number of common fries that people would not call "Belgian style." The sources are good, but the interpretation is wrong. That's my suggestion for improvement.
@Catija: And, if you look at my previous comment, I did offer a possible suggestion for improvement -- i.e., maybe there's something more specific about the double-frying technique. But that technique itself is an incredibly common one and not unique enough to explain the difference from the "average fry" the question asks for.
@Catija: And lastly, I provided my comment because I almost never downvote answers (as I mentioned in my comment). I generally believe in promoting positive things more than downvoting, so when I do rarely downvote, I think it's useful to leave a comment. I'm sorry if that's "inappropriate," but many users ask for comments to explain downvotes.
You edited your comment @Athanasius . The suggestion didn’t exist when I saw the comment initially. There might be other factors. Many of those present in the final list are not associated with fries from McDonald’s. So perhaps reducing it to the frying style alone goes too far.
@Catija: I accidentally hit the "return" button on my phone, which was why the initial comment registered as it did. I edited as quickly as I could. Sorry for the confusion.
Yes, the oil can be a major difference. Many Belgian fries were cooked in horse fat, or a combination of horse & beef fat.
Although most American fries are cooked in vegetable oils, McDonalds previously used part beef fat.
I would argue that using animal fats for cooking is one of the major differences between Belgian and American fries ... but there's also a secret step between the first and second fry -- you shake up the potatoes to sort of 'bruise' them, which will rough up the surface and create a crispier texture in the second fry.
You can't really get away with this 'bruising' step with slender french fries -- even the American 'steak fries' tend to be too long for this ... you just end up with little bits of potato, rather than 'fries'.
Animal fats are rarely used even in Belgium anymore @Joe.
Although it is not used that often anymore (because people believe it is less healthy than vegetable oil), it is still considered to be giving the best flavor to the fries, and for that (and its "authenticity") still used in quite a lot of places.
Most fast food fries ARE cooked twice, they are lightly fried at the factory, drained and flash frozen. Then cooked agsin at the restaurant. As far as i can tell, a high percentage, but not all fast food fries are Belgian style. AND in the factory they may use lard for extra flavor, but in the restaurant they generally use vegetable oil.
Some restaurants cook the fries from fresh potatoes. So obviously there are exceptions.
As for thickness, I think that here are thick and thin fries everywhere, that depends on who is cooking them.
The factory fry process does not even cook the fries. thats why the majority of countries around belgium that serve thick cut fries even though they are factory bought are still soft and soggy. The belgian process cooks the fries in the first fry then crisps them in the second
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.783024
| 2016-02-08T01:09:32 |
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|
73220
|
Why are jelly donuts usually raspberry flavored
Why are jelly donuts filled with raspberry flavored jelly unless specified otherwise. There are lemon filled, strawberry filled, etc but if you just ask for a "jelly donut" it will be raspberry filled.
I can't imagine this is true worldwide (and I've never heard of it); where are you?
Welcome to the site brian! This is a fun question. I also wonder where you live. In my area of the Northeast United States a jelly doughnut is usually grape, though it does depend on the store. I think the berry fillings, like raspberry and strawberry, are technically jams, but that's a different subject!
I've always thought it was because artificial raspberry goo tasted closest to the real thing.
I think this might actually be a regional thing. In my area, we're more likely to get blueberry or apple jelly doughnuts. It's probably got to do with whatever fruit is cheapest to use in large quantities for the location where the doughnuts are being made.
Strawberries - unless it is artificial strawberry flavor - are far from a cheap option...
@rackandboneman Not necessarily, if you're living in an area where they grow massive amounts of strawberries.
Or even something to do with seasons, or other elements of timing... whatever's generously available when making the batches, or when they're grabbing the doughnuts to sell them, gets given to whoever didin't specify a preference, so there's more of the less-available ones for those who do have a preference.
Raspberries and Strawberries tend to pair well with rich, fat-bearing components, since their strong aroma and mild acidity tends to "cut through" the richness - you will find many examples of them served with rich ingredients like cream, whipped cream, ice cream, yoghurt or in this case, fried dough...
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.783562
| 2016-08-17T18:22:07 |
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|
70663
|
What kind of sausage could I use as a substitute for Cumberland sausage?
I live in the USA and Cumberland sausages don't exist. They have sausage links and patties but I don't want to make sausage casserole and have the flavor altered because I picked the wrong kind of sausage. Can anyone help me?
Perhaps if you explain what "sausage casserole" is? I see tons of sausage casseroles that use uncooked tubes of Jimmy Dean sausages.
I can easily get course ground pork, and then season it myself. Do you have any butcher shops or full-service meat counters at grocery stores near you?
If you read the Wikipedia article you'll see that the main flavour is pepper, both black and white,and that the meat is coarser than in some other sausages.
As it's for a casserole where the flavours have time to come together, I suggest you get sausages without herbs in (which should be easy enough). If possible they'd also have a coarser texture but that probably isn't on the label - you might have to choose based on what you're familiar with. Then add plenty of pepper to the sauce, early in the cooking. My recollection is that the white pepper flavour comes through, but I use black pepper quite heavily so maybe I'm used to that.
The other spices (and herbs though they shouldn't dominate) vary. This recipe includes sage, which other sources (and I) say is wrong, but the nutmeg, mace and coriander all contribute to the classic flavour. While I haven't made it, the recipe I've linked should give some idea of the proportions of spice to meat,assuming your sausages are quite bland to start with.
Edit: I should probably have been clearer that I mean links. Sausage patties aren't really a thing here in the UK. I've seen them twice. Once was McDonald's, the other may have been good but I can't remember.
Varieties will vary by region, but the typical "country" ring sausage will generally fit this bill - the flavors mostly match the recipe, and while it varies from brand to brand, they also have a coarser texture than something like kielbasa. Most supermarkets keep it in with the hot and sweet Italian varieties.
Cumberland Sausage is thick and made in one long ring. Coarse pork mince - either hand-cut or using a very coarse mincer.
Ingredients for the spice mix: white pepper, black pepper, salt, sage, thyme, mace, nutmeg, cayenne.
Use very little mace and nutmeg - but they are a key to authentic Cumberland Sausage flavour.
Casing for the genuine thing has to be natural pig intestine.
This is a tough one.
To purchase Cumberland, I found:
Myers of Keswick, NY NY
Parkers, Buffalo NY
Proper British Bacon
Keswick appears to only be a walk-in market. Proper and Parkers, on the other hand take internet orders and ship.
You could try and make your own: There's this How to make a Sausage video. I can't vouch for it since I didn't watch all 20 minutes.
Or for substitutions: The description of Cumberland being peppery made me think of Bob Evan Hot Sausage, which is readily available and economical throughout the US. It is not equivalent of Cumberland, because it will have savory spices such as Sage, Rosemary and Thyme. Maybe you could use it on one of your trial runs.
Cumberland sausage not be peppery, but I don't think anyone would call it hot.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.783748
| 2016-06-12T20:56:49 |
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|
71429
|
Question on yeast quality?
I'm about to buy some ingreadients for a bread recipe which calls for quick yeast. I looked up some info and basically it looks like quick yeast is instant yeast, so first off if I could get a varification on that, that would be great. But assuming they are the same leads me to my actual question. I'm looking at two yeast products to buy, both look like their from France. One is almost two and a half time more expensive, but the more expensive one is the exact same product used in the recipe. So I'm wondering does it make a difference? Here are the two products:
Saf Instant Yeast, 1 Pound Pouch
Doves Farm Quick Yeast (125g)
In much of the world, there's plenty of perfectly good yeast you can buy at the grocery store too, no real need to shop around for specific brands.
If you're not baking bread very often, be warned that it can take a while to get through a 1lb bag of yeast. (as it takes me a year or so, I transfer mine to a glass jar, and keep it in the fridge ... it almost fully fits in a 24oz jar).
Yes, quick yeast and instant yeast are the same thing. It doesn't have to be proofed in warm water before being mixed into the dough.
SAF instant yeast is a good product, so personally, I wouldn't spend so much more for a specialty brand. Both brands contain yeast and an emulsifier, and SAF also contains ascorbic acid (which acts as a dough conditioner).
Resources:
SAF Instant
Doves Farm
Ascorbic Acid
|
Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.784023
| 2016-07-15T02:00:56 |
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|
117604
|
Can't figure out why my pizza's bottom is very dry and firm
I have a stone, I usually keep it in my oven ~ about 1 hour with 500F. The pizza turned out to be very tasty except the bottom - dry and firm (~6-7 minutes in the oven). What should I check?
UPD
The base is not just crisp, it's really hard to bite and chew.
My dough:
flour 200g
water 140ml
salt 4g
yeast 0.4g
The process:
I mixed water and flour, leaving for 0.5hour
Add yeast to a small amount of warm water
Add salt and yeast mix into the dough, mix to incorporate
Leave for ~40mins
Fold
Leave for 6 hours.
Bake
The recipe is from the "Flour, Water, Salt, Yeast" book.
I think you will need to add more information about how the base of the pizza was compared to how you wanted it. I think most pizza-makers want a dry base and it is common to aim for a crispy base too. 'Firm' is a bit too vague to understand your problem.
Also, sharing your dough formula and your process will help.
@dbmag9 The base is not just crispy, it's hard to bite and chew, I updated the post.
Which type of flour? Are you baking directly on a stone, like a Neapolitan style?
@moscafj It's just a regular "all-purpose" flour. Yes, I put it right on the stone. Once upon a time, several months ago, when I just started using the stone, the base was not so hard (I used some different recipe) but I can't figure out why. The only significant different is that pizza was much thinner, and 5 minutes were pretty enough. Maybe it's because this pizza is pretty thick?
Are you mixing the salt and yeast together with water before adding it? Also, are you sure you have the recipe right? Do you really have more water than flour?
Gosh, 142% hydration pizza dough using general purpose flour with a probably rather low W-value for baking on the stone. How on earth do you manage to stretch such a thing?
I assumed he mixed up the water and the flour, but yeah..check that @mimic. Something doesn't add up.
@GdD thanks for pointing. I confused here flour and water, please see the updated recipe.
@GdD I'm mixing the flour and water first. The separately - yeast and a little of water. Then add salt and yeast mix to the flour mix.
Salt kills yeast, it's advised you don't bring salt into direct contact with yeast in high concentration.
@GdD Thanks but I think my yeasts are totally fine taking into account how they grew up.
I believe your water content is too high. I use a reciepe similar to yours to cause the exact effect you dont like. High water content cause a crust so chewy it is hard to bite through. Try 90-110ml of water instead of 200ml.
When the stone hits that high water content is does something similar to when you mist bread in the oven to make blisters.
Perhaps....70% hydration is high for Neapolitan pizza. Try reducing to 60 - 65%, for starters.
Thanks, I will try out the next time (next weekend) and let you know if it worked or not.
I still want to know how he managed to stretch a 140% hydration dough. that's not dough, it's pudding.
@FuzzyChef I mixed up the flour and water - here, not in reality.
I suspect at least a part of the issue might be having too little alveoles (air bubbles/pouches) in the dough. If the dough size has not doubled after step 6 you might need a longer rise. If it has doubled you need to take care to work the dough in a way these bubbles not destroyed or flattened out before the bake.
In case you are aiming for a Neapolitan style with soft an fluffy dough a higher temperature and thus a shorter baking time would help to reduce the amount of evaporation that takes place.
In case you want a crunchier pizza adding some oil will help.
Thanks, but I don't think it's the reason. The dough was more than perfect, it doubled after 3 hours or so and after 6 hours it was filled up with a LOT of bubbles. Even although I flattened it a lot when prepared, it raised great when baking, and the taste was delicious. But the base was firm like a stone...
I see, but I still have no clear imagination what your desired result is. Are you aiming for a Pizza Neapoletana, a thin Romana Tonda, a thicker al taglio or rather for an American style Pizza with a thick and fluffy base?
Sorry, @J. Mueller, I'm a noob in the pizza's classification... I can't answer your questions precisely. I wanted my pizza to be delicious (check), slightly crispy (check), and bottom to be slightly crispy, not the stone firm (ups).
In addition to water content (per Adam Wheeler's answer) the other reason for unpleasant chewiness in a home-oven pizza is protein content and gluten development. When you bake a pizza at 450-500F as opposed to 700-800F in a pizza oven, it cooks longer and can become tough. The solution is to reduce the protein content per Cook's Illustrated(paywall). By having a lower-protein flour and working it minimally, you get a more "tender" pizza when baking at a lower temperature.
I've used this recipe a bunch of times, and make a pizza dough that is 25% either semolina or corn flour to reduce the protein content, with less than 5 min of kneading, at 60% hydration. Works quite well. And if it ends up being too soft, you can tinker with the percentages, kneading, and rise time until you dial in the right consistency.
Thanks! What is in the recipe? How is it different from mine (I updated mine because I mixed up flour and water)?
Figured I could find someone on the interwebs who bootlegged it: https://www.craftybaking.com/recipe/cooks-illustrated-pizza-dough That's the original, which uses cake flour. I recommend using corn flour or semolina or even rye instead, to give it a bit more flavor.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.784175
| 2021-10-24T05:11:56 |
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|
126312
|
How to make Chinese thousand-layer cake/bun/bread/mochi that puffs up?
The following video shows a frozen disk grilled for a few minutes and flipped, and the result puffs up 2-3cm/1". Very nice. https://www.facebook.com/ccdesan/videos/744030087169350/
Here's a Taiwanese merchant selling them frozen: https://www.owlting.com/market/items/21459
I've known a recipe since the 1980s that is made nearly the same, with sesame oil and green onion, but it makes kind of a nest of straw that doesn't fluff up and would probably be impossible to stuff. Generally you make a simple Chinese dough with flour and boiling water, roll it out very thin, then roll that up into a log. You then slice the log in perhaps 2-3cm/1" long sections and roll those flat. This is a different but similar technique. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdIVbEgve1A
If anyone has a pointer to a puff-up technique in any language I'd much appreciate it.
I‘m afraid but I can’t access the video. You may want to check again.
@Stephie could you try the link again? Should now be publicly accessible.
Sorry, no. I still get an “can’t open, invalid address” pop-up.
This is the bread part in a common snack in China called 肉夹馍 (Rou Jia Mo) which literally means "meat sandwiched 'mo'" and "mo" refers to the bread. Otherwise the bread itself is called 盘丝饼 (Pan Si Bing), "Si" refers to any thin threads and "Pan" means to "neatly wrap" (into a bundle or pile, like when you plate a nest of spaghetti), so "Pan Si" refers to the neatly twisted down into a pile of threads and "bing" means any flat bread. In the video you linked to, instead of meat, they put a fried egg instead.
There are different variations of the bread, some falls apart into threads when you pull the bread apart, the one in your video can be sliced in half and still keep its shape to use as the bread for a burger. So, here is a video that makes a bread like the one in your video that you can slice open: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8IZEPxoT8A
Note:
Just so you don't get confused: this is one of the videos with better results I saw, but it has very bad machine-made English translated subtitles, so when it talks about the "film" such as at 4:49, it means the bread. This is because it's machine translated, it can't distinguish between "膜" and "馍", both pronounced the same but the first means "film" or "membrane" but the second means a type of bread. For the same reason, when it talks about "exam" at 6:10, it means th baking time since the word for exam and baking is pronounced the same in Mandarin.
Also if you use a lid on your pan like in your video, you might not have to go through the trouble of baking it too after frying it in the pan.
The video doesn't make it very clear, but at 2:57, it's not a roller that she uses to flatten the dough, but a cutter to cut the dough into many thin threads. See this video at 6:18 to see it better (it's a demonstration rather than a recipe): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRnpE29GM2g
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.784591
| 2024-01-08T14:10:48 |
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|
70664
|
How to keep pasta hot, yet not sticky in crock pot?
We are having a pasta "bar" for a party that will last several hours. How do you keep pasta HOT and NOT sticky. (I have seen several answers for COLD and not sticky, but not for hot.)
I've not personally tried this with larger quantities, but I have the best success keeping hot pasta non-sticky in smaller quantities (assuming you want to keep pasta and sauce wholly separate) when I do the following three things:
Cook in a large amount of water; this will keep the amount of starch in the water down to a bare minimum.
After draining, rinse off as much of the surface starch as you can; you might need to keep a separate pot of near-boiling water ready for this.
Add a small amount of whatever oil or fat the sauce is based on (olive oil, butter) to the pasta and mix it in.
This is all assuming it is completely unacceptable to sauce the pasta ahead of time.
Good luck!
Your basic idea will definitely work. We used an oil and butter mix for keeping it not sticky. I would not use a strong flavored oil such as olive oil. Remember to keep the lid closed except when serving because the outer exposed pasta could dry up somewhat!
My usual guideline on the oil to use is based on whatever the sauce has - so for (e.g.) an Alfredo sauce, it would definitely be butter and not olive oil. If the sauce were a tomato and olive oil sauce, however, olive oil would be my choice.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.784961
| 2016-06-12T21:18:09 |
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|
68465
|
Pimento sauce that is added to mayo
My mother would grow her own pimentos, then she would clean and cut them up and melt them down in a pot and slowly reduce them down to a thick sauce. Then she added other ingredients which I believe were raw eggs, but not sure. When it was down she would refrigerate it then added it to mayo. You have never tasted potatoe salad like hers ever. This recipe is at least 50 yrs old and she never passed this recipe down to to me before she passed away. Please, if you have any idea what I'm talking about please answer.
I don't see how this is a recipe recommendation. Looks like a user trying to identify what the recipe is in the first place. If you don't know what to call the product, it's difficult to find a recipe.
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Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.785101
| 2016-04-22T03:33:20 |
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|
120581
|
What's the lowest ratio of oil to vinegar that you can use in a vinaigrette?
Thanks to the assistance of a smart food blogger, who saw immediately EXACTLY what I was asking, and knew how to phrase it to show that I'm NOT asking for opinions, I now have the following revised phrasing of the question:
In order to have a proper vinaigrette, that doesn't separate back out 5 seconds after you mix it, it needs to be EMULSIFIED. Let's assume that we're talking about a standard emulsifier for vinaigrette; ½ teaspoon of Dijon mustard per tablespoon of vinegar.
The goal is to get the vinaigrette to STAY emulsified for some reasonable amount of time, in other words, to create a STABLE emulsion. According to one major site, "Properly emulsified dressings will stay mixed for at least a day or two in the refrigerator."
https://www.allrecipes.com/article/how-to-emulsify-vinaigrette/
As you lower the ratio of oil to vinegar in a vinaigrette, it gradually becomes more difficult to emulsify, eventually reaching the point where it is no longer possible to form a STABLE EMULSION. Assuming access to normal home equipment and ingredients only, in other words no industrial mixers or chemicals, at room temperature, what is the lowest proportion of oil to vinegar at which a STABLE emulsion can be produced?
Thank you for clarifying/adding an objective critierion for your question; I reopened it. I am still not entirely sure that there is a clear-cut answer to it, but maybe people will be able to describe it in a helpful way.
i would argue that once you put any other ingredients, than the oil and acid, that are designed to maintain an emulsification, that it is no longer a vinaigrette but a dressing.
Wouldn't call guar gum 'chemical'. Allows for very low oil emulsion
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.785198
| 2022-05-13T03:59:32 |
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|
46254
|
hardened residue after high heat cooking (carbon steel and cast iron)
Here is my one month old De Buyer pan:
I've seasoned it off and on in the last month at least 10 times, using thin layers of oil and on the stove top. It's very dark brown to black over the entire cooking surface. This is my first pan that requires seasoning (carbon steel or cast iron) so I'm just feeling my way in the dark here.
I had some initial traumatic experiences with bacon. The "internets" claim that bacon is fatty and great to break-in a newly seasoned pan. Lies. Lies. The sugar in bacon burnt into the pan and I had to boil water to remove the stains, which took some seasoning away. Since then I've cooked eggs, pancakes, Kartoffelpuffer, char kway teow, and caramelized steak with great success. I'm finally starting to feel this pan is living up to the hype.
After charring some sous vide steaks over high heat this morning, I noticed black splotches on the pan:
I've cleaned the pan (water, brush, plastic scrubby) probably more than I should already, so this is not something that can be cleaned off. That makes sense as the high heat used to char the steaks is very similar to a seasoning session. It's just uneven.
Is this (making the pan bottom slightly uneven) a problem? Is this to be expected? Is this the type of thing repeated ad infinitum that makes heirloom cast iron so valuable?
I'm a little puzzled because those two pictures don't appear to be of the same pan. ???
They are the same pan taken seconds apart. I tilted in the second picture and used the flash to highlight the burnt on bits.
probably the kitchen-wisdom that bacon is great for a newly seasoned pan was started before people started putting sugar in the bacon.
In the restaurant, we just poured some coarse salt into the pan and put it on high heat (gas range). Then tossed the salt around and poured out the results.
At home, with the electric range top, I put my carbon steel wok on a burner on high (it's scary, but it works) and watch as everything burns off and the carbon steel "steel" look returns.
The brilliance doesn't last but the surface does. I use a cotton rag that is very lightly dabbed in peanut oil to brush the surface while it's hot.
And then it darkens when it's cooling/cooled.
Don't hesitate to go hot, really hot. Just be safe at the same time.
The clean with salt thing is described elsewhere as a part of the "ritual" cleaning after use. How often do you do it?
In the restaurant it was an everyday practice. At home, I'll perform the ritual as needed - sometimes cooking other things will remove the residue and it's no longer an issue. I've had my carbon steel wok look like your reference pic and just leaving it on scary-high heat burned it off and seasoned the surface. Open your window and turn on the exhaust fan, it doesn't take long.
I did the salt thing with a little bit of oil to properly clean rest of the pan and then the dry high heat burn-off and it worked.
Thanks for the feedback. Just to clarify for future readers... Did you have cast iron or carbon steel?
Carbon steel...
Your residue looks like burnt on carbohydrates to me. It can happen with both sugar and bread, but bread gives it a different shape, it chars in a crumb-like texture. Yours seems like viscous caramel flowed until it burnt on.
The seasoning of a young pan is indeed quite sensitive. Don't make sticky stuff in it.
What I have found to work well in new pans is meat with sufficient amount of fat, such as marbled chops or steaks. You also need to do some decent deglazing after that, to remove the stuck-on meat.
If you get protein residue, make something with wet eggs to clean it. Crepes work great for leaving you with mirrorlike pan seasoning. Use a little bit of oil between every 2-3 crepes. If you can do good scrambled eggs or an omelette, this is also a good pan "cleaner", and the residue taste fits better. But if you are likely to dry out the eggs, it can happen that they take off the not-yet-settled seasoning with them.
Wet carbohydrates (such as the flour in crepe batter) are no problem, but once dry carbohydrates burn on, I don't know of any method to remove them without damaging the seasoning (and sugar syrup counts as a dry carbohydrate if it stays for long enough to caramelize). Just don't use them on new pans. Once your pan is seasoned well with use, you can start using them, but always combine them with sufficient fat - you should be shallow frying the items which have them, not grilling.
The oil which you used for seasoning also matters. I've seen lots of sources to recommend flax and other unsaturated oils, because they polymerise easier. The problem is that they are also stickier after polymerisation, especially if the polymerisation wasn't complete. Try seasoning with something which has a larger percentage of saturated fat (lard, coconut oil) and cooking with it the first few times. If you are doing a multi-layer seasoning, you can start the first one or two layers with flax, for a better grip between polymer and metal, but seal it with a saturated oil.
If you cannot physically remove the caramel residue but want to strip the seasoning and start anew, remove it chemically. Use a strong base, I prefer a lye soak. Don't use acid, it will rust the pan in seconds. You can also leave it there, but it will reduce the evenness of heat transfer and increase the chance that the new seasoning flakes off.
What's the downside of just letting it build and even seasoning on top of the black residue? It does not seem to affect the non-stick qualities of the pan.
@event_jr the structural difference of having multiple chemically distinct layers with interfaces between them, as well as a less even geometry, will interfere with the evenness of heating and will increase the chance of the new seasoning flaking off. I am certain that this is the kind of effect you'll get, but I don't know what the scale of the effect will be in practice - you could season over it and hope that the difference will be too small to notice.
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.785367
| 2014-08-10T00:36:44 |
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|
30637
|
slow cooker / crock pot temperature confusion (everything boils)
On a whole I'd like someone to explain how slow cooker / crock pot recipes are
supposed to work?
I mean they tell you to cook xxx all day on high, or yyy for 6 hours on high
then switch to low, etc, etc, etc.
BUT, the actual devices themselves whatever name they go by (slow cooker, crock
pot, etc) are completely un-standardized. So "high" for one brand might
very well be low for another brand. How then can I trust or follow slow
cooker "recipes" (double-quotes intentional)?
To give a frame of reference, when a recipe says to cook under 15 PSI in a
pressure cooker or 230 C in an oven, it's much clearer what the inputs should
be and what results I can expect.
About a year ago, I tried to follow some slow cooker recipes and found that
the particular slow cooker I have (a cheapo Ronson one) would boil its
contents even on "low" setting. Surely that wasn't slow cooking? And even
with it boiling its contents, I still found that a longer cook time is needed
than the recipe states. I'm not familiar with what the outputs should
look/taste like (it was a black beans soup IIRC); the impreciseness of the
whole experience just put me off slow cookers.
Recently I got a PID controller that holds my cheapo Ronson within 0.1 oC of
my specified temperature (for sous vide cooking). So I'd like to try slow
cooking again. What temperature should I use when I see "high" or "low" on
recipes? And where can I get some reliable recipes?
Wikipedia says 77 oC for "low" and 88-93 oC for "high". But 88-93 is a
broad range.
I see this question is asking something similar, but got no answer.
Your question is really, really close to a duplicate of the other. Pretty much all you've done is add "where can I find recipes" and "how can I trust/follow? recipes" and a lot of extra background.
(Also, the other question did get an answer; it just didn't follow quite through to the end, and it wasn't the answer you wanted.)
@Jefromi the other question asked "what temperature ...", which was not answered. Your answer below is outstanding though.
The temperatures mentioned on Wikipedia were dead wrong, and referenced Yahoo Answers. I've corrected it :). I think possibly the confusion may lie in manufacturer statements made about food safety. As in "we can't say what temperature they cook at, because that's not how it works -- but we can guarantee that it'll reach [safe temperature for meat] within [time]"
It sounds like you were expecting slow cooking to be like sous vide. Well, it's not. The point isn't controlled sub-boiling temperatures, it's something on the border between simmering and boiling for foods that just need a long time to cook at that approximate temperature.
Slow cooker recipes are not supposed to be very sensitive. They're expecting to be approximately boiling for most of the time, and the difference between low and high is pretty much whether the boil is marginal or a bit more substantial. In many cases, this just matters because the quantity in the pot varies, and it takes more to keep the stuff at the top hotter if it's farther from the bottom, or if it hasn't all cooked down into the liquid yet. In either case, it shouldn't be a full rolling boil; it's just boiling on the bottom, so the rest of the liquid is probably a bit below the boiling point. And yes, this is still slow cooking. It's not boiling fast enough to lose a huge amount of liquid (or worse, boil over) with the lid on.
I wouldn't really try to assign temperatures to slow cooker recipes. Like I said, they shouldn't be that sensitive. If your bean soup recipe didn't work, maybe it was a bad one. But "reliable" in the context of slow cooker recipes doesn't mean "exact times and temperatures". They're generally things that will be perfectly fine if you cook them 25% longer. Not everything in the kitchen has to be precise and formulaic; slow cookers and slow cooker recipes take advantage of that fact. And even if you do try to calibrate, you'll have trouble, since there's a temperature gradient from bottom to top. Unlike sous vide, a slow cooker is not constantly well-mixed. In equilibrium it'll be boiling at the bottom, and 10-20 degrees cooler at the top.
If you really wanted to use a sous vide controller, I imagine something like 95-98C would work for basically every slow cooker recipe, no matter whether they say high or low. Of course, mixing thoroughly enough to make your controller actually work, you may be overstirring whatever you're cooking. But the point is, things you cook in a slow cooker aren't really going to care much what the exact temperature is; it just matters that it's hot, near boiling, and not boiling so fast that it sticks on the bottom or loses a lot of liquid.
Finding reliable recipes... Well, it's like anything else. If you're looking on the internet, you have to learn to judge for yourself and look for warning signs, or stick to sites with lots of reviews. You also have to accept that sometimes you have to test for doneness and be flexible about time. This isn't really unusual; baking recipes should always have some kind of test ("until golden brown") and the actual baking times will vary. (With something like bean soup, sure, maybe the recipe was bad, maybe you didn't soak enough, maybe the beans were a little different. A stovetop recipe wouldn't have been precise either.) If all that isn't good enough for you, buy a slow cooker cookbook; tons of those have been published in recent years.
Really, slow cookers are meant to hold things at a simmer, not a boil. A boil implies a large amount of energy entering a vessel to maintain a temp (100C or 212F) that is regulated by water's properties. A simmer is what takes place at the temp range just below that.
@sarge_smith Yes, but typically, a simmer in a slow cooker means that the bottom is boiling and you see some bubbles. Since there's not going to be much stirring, and they're a decent volume, it's hard for the top to be sufficiently hot without the bottom boiling.
I agree, except that (often) the heating elements are not at the bottom. On mine they're attached to a metal band which conducts the heat around the metal wall of the space in which the pot sits. The ceramic pot further disperses the heat. So the boiling is probably happening somewhere along the wall of the pot.
Thanks to Cooks Illustrated/America's Test Kitchen going out and testing a lot of slow cookers as part of writing Slow Cooker Revolution—which I'd strongly recommend if your goal is to get tasty results, not just no-effort ones—and also a fair bit of personal experience, I can state that different slow cookers reach different temperatures, and it matters quite a bit.
The basic procedure (for a 6qt slow cooker) is fill with 4qt water, turn on high for 6 hours, and use an accurate thermometer to measure the temperature.
In some slow cookers, the result is 212°F (100°C), a nice boil. Best course of action is to discard said slow cooker. Or return it to the store if still in return period.
I've owned ones that get up to 100°C and really, they burn the food, they cook it to death, etc. I've owned ones that run at 205–207°F on high (and around 200 on low), those work much better.
Cooks Illustrated says that it needs to be above 190°F, or things won't cook adequately, and below 212°F. They have two slow cookers which they tested and think cook the best, they reach:
low: 195°F, 199°F
high: 207°F, 204.5°F
Yes, that's one at 195/207°F and the other at 199/204.5°F. They also measured how long it takes to get to temperature—2 to 3 hours on high, 5 to 7 on low.
I think if you set your PID controller to the 199/204.5°F temperatures, you'll get good results. And I suspect you'll be right in the middle of the time ranges given in Slow Cooker Revolution.
As my answer on the other question you referenced shows, typical in slow cookers, "high" and "low" do not refer to temperature -- they do not contain a thermostat. Rather, "high" and "low" refer to the power of the heating elements.
(If you need a refresher on the difference between "temperature", "heat" and "power", now's a good time to go to your high school text books).
The heating elements are on constantly, one for "warm", another for "low", both for "high" (on cheaper models). The ceramic pot spreads the heat so that the food doesn't burn. Some of the heat is lost through the walls. Some of the heat raises the temperature of the contents. If some of the liquid content reaches a temperature where it evaporates, then that's what happens, and the heat is used up that way instead.
The slow cooker has no way of knowing what temperature your food is at, or whether it's boiling. It just keeps pumping out heat. However, typicvally the designers have picked suitable powers such that:
"high" will bring a full pot of cold-ish contents to boiling point in 20 minutes or so, but it's not powerful enough to power a full rolling boil.
You can turn it on, do something else for "a while", then come back to turn it down to low.
It will never boil over, but if left for a long time it could conceivable boil dry.
"low" will bring take an hour or more to bring a full pot of cold-ish contents to boiling point. Once at that point, it will fuel a very gentle simmer indeed.
This means it takes a long time to cook, because for a good chunk of the first hour, it's not hot enough to be cooking.
You can leave it all day long, with no fear of it boiling dry.
"warm" puts approximately as much heat as the designers expect to be lost out of the pot walls, so the temperature stays approximately constant.
Some models have an "auto" setting, which is effectively a timer which switches from "high" to "low" after a period - so it gets to boiling point quickly, then stays there all day.
All of this is very approximate: they are not manufactured to strict tolerances. The ambient temperature in your kitchen will affect performance -- in a cold kitchen it will take longer to reach boiling point and simmer more gently; in a warm kitchen it will boil sooner and more vigorously. Atmospheric pressure will affect the boiling point of your food.
I learned this the hard way. I thought I could be greener by wrapping the slow cooker in a towel, so less heat would be lost out of the side, and the thermostat would cut off the heaters sooner. Since there is no thermostat, however, all that happened is that the food boiled too hard.
So, recipes don't give a temperature range, because slow cookers are not set to a temperature. The temperature is "the boiling point of the contents". The recipes can work with the variety in power between different models, because they are recipes with very broad tolerances.
Good slow cooker recipes work within all of this. They are not particularly sensitive to temperature or time. For example, a stew made with a cut of meat that responds to slow, gentle cooking. A lamb shank might be done after six hours in a slow cooker - but another two or three hours won't hurt it. The classic slow-cooking scenario is that you start a meal cooking in the morning, not knowing exactly when you'll get home to eat it. So if you seek precision, slow cooking probably isn't for you.
However, there's certainly a good geeky project for someone who wants to build a slow cooker that's truly frugal with energy: add a thermostat, add plenty of insulation, have it bring the contents to (say) 100°C then keep it there with the thermostat. On the other hand, you can get similar results by simply bringing a stew to the boil then transferring the pot to an insulated box.
Wow, your slow cooker is running very high if it boils in 20 minutes.
@derobert I should test and check; it's a bit of a gut feel since I normally start with a warm/hot mixture and start the slow cooker on low -- e.g. brown meat in a pan, add to slow cooker, fry onions, add, deglaze with wine or tomato juice...
|
Stack Exchange
|
2025-03-21T13:24:57.785882
| 2013-02-02T14:18:07 |
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|
110541
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dhungar method: How can I make smoky dal tadka without charcoal?
Normally one is to get a piece of charcoal red-hot, put it in a small metal cup, put some ghee on it to burn/smoke, and put it in the pot with the finished dal tadka curry.
I don't have charcoal. And even if I bought charcoal I don't have a gas burner to heat it. I have IH burners (electric induction heating, which can't heat charcoal).
Have you thought about using liquid smoke?
Yes I've thought of it but here in Japan it's not available that I can see. Buying on Amazon is like $5 for the liquid smoke plus $25 for shipping for US or Australia!
that would be a great reason not to use it!
Find a bowl that your curry fits into, and that in turn fits in a tall pot.
Put the ghee in the bottom of the tall pot, and the bowl into the pot. Put a tight lid and set to highest temperature for 5-15 minutes. Observe the smoke if you have a glass lid and experiment to find the best results for you.
This also warms up the curry if it is leftovers.
I was worried about the unequal heat shattering my ceramic bowl, so I rested it on a small silicone trivet meant to be good for any temperature that the pot could reach.
You could also use a steaming rack like this, which are usually metal.
Smoked salt for general use in kitchen to get "smoked/grilled" taste or for dal tadka smoked chilli pepper. Latter is no so strong as normal chilli (so you use more) but give nice aftertaste to spiceness.
We cook a lot with Hungarian smoked paprika (Chicken Paprikash, etc.) so I used a bit of that instead of the recommended Kashmiri chili powder. However I wasn't able to use enough of it to really make a difference. Further, I'm worried that if I used enough to make it smoky, I'll have also made my dal curry taste like Hungarian food :-D
@SwissFrank smoked salt have this ability that is don't make food salty. So you can make it taste smoked without any fear of changing the taste.
Ghee candle.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ge1O9rH__5Y
Depicted: butter candle from the King of Random. It is basically a half stick of butter with a toilet paper wick. You can see it gives off a little smoke as it burns. That smoke is the flavor you want - burned butter flavor.
Make a ghee candle. Put it in a pot with your curry. The pot will become a smoke chamber. You will need to work with the lid to figure out how much of an opening you need - you want the smoke to stay in there and flavor your curry but you need some air to feed the candle.
I ended up burning my last dal tadka a little bit, so the result tasted smokey anyway!
I don't suggest this as a good answer. I only record it as an answer...
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.786805
| 2020-09-04T03:50:17 |
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100757
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Thai Curry seems more watery over the last year?
I've made Thai Penang Curry probably ONE THOUSAND TIMES. Not quite weekly for 25 years. No joke.
Over the last year or so, I've noticed it's surprisingly watery, however I haven't changed my method or my brands of ingredients so what could it be? Has the world standard for coconut milk simply changed, I wonder? (Something similar happened in the US when wheat varieties were changed practically nationwide over a few years; I hear they planned the switchover to be gradual so as not to surprise people.)
I've always used Mae Ploy Panang Curry Paste, usually in envelopes but sometimes in the big plastic tub when I had a bigger refrigerator.
I've always used Chaokoh or Aroy-D coconut milk. Sometimes I've used western brands and never noticed a difference up or down. One time by mistake I used LITE coconut milk and it sucked big-time. The difference I'm seeing now isn't that difference. (Aside: in Hong Kong, they don't allow the product term "lite" and when an importer brings in products labelled for other countries, which is quite common, they paint over the "lite" part of the label. That's good as it doesn't fool people into thinking it's low-calorie, but it's bad that the taste is utterly different.
My method varies a little bit but doesn't affect the results. I always use chicken breast, same day I bought it if possible, sliced and fried in vegetable oil or sometimes the cream from the can. It doesn't seem to matter which. I used to always add a thin-sliced garlic and 5 or so Thai chilis and fry until fragrant before adding chicken, but now that I have kids I don't bother. I've NEVER fried the paste as is often recommended; I just pour in a can of coconut milk and put in the envelope of roux and squash the lumps out for a few minutes. Oh: also julienne 10 lime leaves as finely as possible after removing their spine. Also I boil a dozen pea eggplants 10 min in water separately, then add them to the curry.
OK so for the last 12-18 months, it just seems more watery than I remember. Either my memory is somehow slipping, and it's always been like this, or something has changed (such as the world standard for how much fat coconut milk has). I've actually taken to sprinkling just a tiny bit of flour as a thickener and boiling briefly. Any ideas?
UPDATE: I've now tried Merito brand "Certified Organic" Coconut Milk in Japan. Ingredients include only processed coconut and guar gum (the thickener missing from Chaokoh brand coconut milk, at least now in Japan, not sure about the past or in other countries). I added a whole small can of coconut cream (I forget brand and size) but no joy. Still seemed watery. And I've verified there's no water in the pan from the chicken that would be watering it down. I'll try a different brand of cream next time and report volume and brand.
I think it would be hard to pinpoint a cause. There are just too many variables. For example, have you cooked on the same stove for the last 25 years? Used the same eggplant? The list goes on... Maybe just cook it a little more before you add the ingredients that might over-cook (chicken, for example) so that some of the water evaporates and it thickens slightly. It won't solve the mystery, but you'll continue to enjoy your curry.
I'd expect agricultural products to have changed more than industrial processed stuff ... so maybe it's the eggplants?
I appreciate the brainstorming, thx. It's not the eggplants as I leave them out sometimes and same result. (Also I boil them separately, then shake them dryish before putting into the curry.)
I haven't used the same stove, but to turn that around I've cooked it on like 8+ stoves without problem so I don't see the ninth being the culprit. I currently have gas as several of mine have been in the past, though same results on IH and ceramic-top electric.
One suggestion I've seen is that it might be the chicken. Problems started more or less when I started buying Japan-reared chicken at Keikyuu supermarket instead of Tokyo's main foreigner market Nisshin where I've traditionally gotten US chicken that's cheaper.
I've read a coconut milk comparison where I noticed Chaokoh brand seems to be the only brand without guar gum in the ingredients. It sounds like a thickener. I'll switch to another brand and see if joy transpires.
OK, the problem's the chicken. I usually cook the chicken, then pour in the coconut milk and roux and beat the lumps out in a time-consuming fashion.
Last night I moved the chicken to a bowl, so that I mix the roux and milk more smoothly, and was surprised to see that two big breasts had left over a quarter-cup of water/liquid in the pan. I disposed of that. By the time I had slowly mixed the milk in, smoothing out roux lumps, and getting a smooth sauce, there was another nearly 1/4 cup of liquid in the bowl.
After smoothing the curry, I added the chicken sans juice, jullienned lime leaf, and the dozen or so roach berries I throw in just for variety although I don't love them.
And the results were back to usual!
I was using a different brand of coconut milk from my usual but it looked the same as always so I don't think it was a factor.
Meanwhile I don't know what's up about this particular butcher counter's chicken that is so much more watery than other chicken breast I've bought in five different countries, and many many other outlets in Japan, in the past. My current grocery for chicken breast is unique in that it's a butcher counter selling domestic meat. Most other places I've bought have been pre-packaged meat (at least in styrofoam trays) or non-Japanese meat. I've wondered whether they're somehow injecting the meat with more water to make it heavier but I don't think so. We've often noted that this counter's meat gives some of the best results we've had over the years, outside of this one dish.
EDIT: it was stupid to throw away the juice as it had some flavor and nutrition in it. Now, I pour that juice into the pan with the coconut milk and roux, and simply boil at medium heat until it is properly thickened. I go back to the chicken which will have leaked a bit more water by then, and put that in the curry too. Then I finally add the chicken (which I've only 90% cooked anyway, to avoid overcooking) and give it another 30-60 seconds to reheat and finish cooking.
Looks like demand is exceeding supply. An excess of old trees, and diseases are hitting production, and likely quality, as well.
You're not alone, I've noticed coconut milk being watery too, it used to have a decent layer of cream on top and now there is practically none. When I make thai curries, I use coconut cream and coconut milk (half and half) to get a nice creamy taste.
EXACTLY, there was always a bunch hanging on the lid when you opened a can, and I haven't seen that in a year or more. Last week I bought a can of cream (not sure the brand) and it just seemed to be more like syrupy, clumpy milk, not the cream I was expecting.
my current working theory is that the problem is the chicken, not the coconut milk. While the coconut milk does look different, my guess is that it's just processed so that it doesn't separate as much.
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.787052
| 2019-08-16T04:23:47 |
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63067
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Sauerkraut/sourkraut - ratio of grams of salt to grams of raw cabbage?
Yes, obviously it can vary. I'm just looking for an approximate range, as a good place to start for my first time making a batch.
A good answer would be something along the lines of:
10 to 20 grams of salt per 100 grams of raw cabbage
Or something like that.
[EDIT: that was just the format of answer I wanted. That actual ratio would probably be about ten times too much salt.]
I would add that there is, IME, minimal need to work the cabbage after mixing the salt in - some call for mixing it for half an hour. It's mostly the salt, and half an hour, that's needed, rather than mixing for half an hour that's needed. A minute or two of mixing spread over the half hour works just fine. And unless your cabbage is seriously dried out, you should not need to add any water. On my last batch I ground the salt in a mortar to get extra-fine salt (not essential, but probably helps it work a little faster.)
2% (20g per 1000g) would be my default recommendation based on sources local to me, but with care less salt may work if sanitation is extremely good (to minimize introduction of undesirable bacteria which the salt helps to supress.)
On the high end, I can say that 4% seems to slow things down, but work, and 8% seems to be simply too much. The pictured jars are 2%, 4% and 8% salt, using red cabbage, which acts as a pH indicator. The 8% jar (rightmost) has not turned pink (and is growing mold on the surface) while the other two are successfully acidifying (the 2% somewhat faster than the 4%) and mold-free. The lids are put on "fingertip-tight" as in canning, so they form a crude but effective airlock seal (they "burp" themselves as needed, just as in canning - they are not loosened manually to relieve pressure.)
Actually 75% red cabbage and 25% apples for these. And the stuff on top is some ceramic tile as improvised weights. Other than for pictures, they are kept in the dark.
By the way, about how long did these different batches take to reach ready-to-eat-ness? Like, for the 2%, say, how many weeks -ish? 1, 2, 4?
Not beng fond of contamination from opening the jars to check, and being of the firm belief that 6 weeks is about minimum to get to finished kraut (and 8 is not bad place to shoot for) we opened them up at 7 weeks. The 8% was tossed due to doubts about it stemming from mold, and the other two did seem reasonably finished. That's operating about 65-70F or 18-21C - some sources do say you can get it finished faster (3-4 wks) at 75F but others say the quality is not so good. Many of the "dubious health claim" sites seem to be fond of opening it way too soon. The 4% needed de-brining (rinsing.)
Thank you. I get a lovely taste with this ratio. However, I've spoiled the taste when I needed to add water. I ended up adding also 2% of the weight of water as salt to the water, and it makes the sauerkraut too salty.
Any tips on how much salt to add to the water that I am forced to add sometimes when I can't squeeze out enough water from the red cabbage itself?
I checked a few German Sources1 and found a range between
7.5g salt per kg cabbage2 and
20g salt per kg cabbage3.
So anywhere between one and a generous two teaspoons per kilogram (two pounds) should be fine.
But what exactly is the salt doing in your cabbage/sauerkraut?
Well, in theory you could leave it out. The bacteria and yeasts necessary for the process will work just fine without it. Unfortunately, so will unwanted bacteria which may be present on your equipment, your cabbage or your environment. Should you choose to try this, work very cleanly, sterilize your gear and do not attempt the open jar method. Still the risk of failure is high.
Salt in your cabbage will hinder all microbiological activity, including your "friendly ones". But unwanted "guests" will be affected far more than your desired acetic and lactic acid bacteria in the range recommended above. Too much salt will stop all fermentation, salt is a preservative, after all.
There is another reason to add some salt, though: The addition of salt supports the release of liquid from your shredded cabbage (together with "kneading" or "pounding" the cabbage), effectively speeding up the formation of the brine.
1 I guess we are nicknamed Krauts for a reason...
The upper end of your range (2% w/w) is the lower end of what's recommended in most US sources (2-3% with most saying 2-2-1/2%.) If going for the lower rate, surgically clean German precision (to minimize the wrong bacteria tagging along) is probably beneficial, at a guess. And, of course, the proper airlocked/anerobic container. My first batch is now done, and wunderbar!
@Ecnerwal True. Should perhaps edit this answer (later) that lower salt increases risk of spoilage while too much salt can inhibit or even prevent fermentation.
This PDF from the University of Wisconsin says to use 2.25 - 2.5 % of non-iodized salt by weight.
https://learningstore.uwex.edu/Assets/pdfs/B2087.pdf
Based on converting from the barbaric units from this source, I guess something like:
15 to 23 grams of salt per 1000 grams of cabbage
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Stack Exchange
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2025-03-21T13:24:57.787739
| 2015-11-02T10:36:23 |
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