Fast way to cook steel-cut oats when no microwave is available

My low-effort steel cut is to set the bowl of steel-cut and water in a steamer and let it go about 20 minutes (or longer) - unlike (my experience of) cooking them in a pot, there's no stirring, boilovers, or other drama. IME the drama fully applies in the microwave and no time is saved by it. But you are not going to cook them in 10 minutes time (2 minutes active work, yes, 10 minutes time, no.) On the other hand, I don't see why you'd be cooking for 40 minutes in any case.

Edit: I begin to suspect from the comments that @Jim is not familiar with the concept of steaming. So, steaming, the short explanation: A small amount of water in a large enough pot. A rack set on the bottom of the pot to elevate the bowl. A bowl contianing food (in this case, steel cut oats and water in a ratio of 1:2) is set on the rack above the water. The lid is put on the pot, the water is boiled, the steam in the pot cooks the food.

Other method I haven't used in years but which worked then and should work now, is to put the oats and boiling water into a wide-mouthed thermos flask the night before. Given that the main reason I haven't done it in years was that I dropped and broke the glass on my wide mouth thermos flask, I would suggest a stainless-steel version rather than a glass version (my stainless steel narrow-mouthed flask is old and dented and still going strong, more than 3 decades after it was new. But I wouldn't want to put anything other than a liquid in it due to the size of the mouth.)


How can I pan fry zucchini without making it soggy?

The key to this is really high heat and pan-fry in a single layer, very quickly. The goal is to get that nice brown caramelized surface and barely cook the interior and then get it out of the pan before it starts to seep water. Also, wait to season with salt until it comes out of the pan so it doesn't draw out the water prematurely.


Is there a safety issue with freezing raw chicken with raw stuffing?

Your method of stuffing and freezing raw should be safe. Assuming you are following safe food handling and freezing methods, you will be fine.

Just prep your chicken and get it into the freezer within the recommended window of two hours that it can safely be in the "danger zone" of 40-140 F.

As it pertains to bacteria, you can think of freezing as stopping time. You are essentially putting all those pesky microbes on pause, so they can't multiply and have a big ol' botulism party on your chicken. So if your food is clean and safe when it goes into the freezer, it should be clean and safe when it comes out.

I can't see any point to par-cooking your chicken, and as James points out, it seems to complicate the process unnecessarily.

Also check out the USDA guide on Freezing and Food Safety.


Can I use a 4 quart crock pot instead of a 6 quart?

I have encountered very few recipes that can't be scaled. In fact the only recipes I can think of are jelly because the pectin behaves oddly.

If the scaled recipe fits comfortably then you are fine.

Keep in mind that a smaller volume may cook faster. This shouldn't be a problem for most slow cooker recipes but use your judgement. If you are braising a pot roast then a bit too long won't hurt much. If you are cooking peach cobbler it might need to finish earlier.


Why did I end up with mushy corned beef?

Take everything I say with a grain of salt (pun intended) as I am writing from Texas where we do nobler things with brisket. A true corned-beef-expert would be of Irish or Jewish descent, and from New York.

The meat should have relatively tough individual fibers that separate easily because of the long, wet cooking. It is pretty difficult to overcook brisket as it is so tough. Like Chuck Norris but tastier. Three hours would definitely not be enough time.

It can be fatty and that will be pretty much up to how much of the fat was trimmed off when it was butchered. An untrimmed brisket has a solid layer of fat that can be as much as a half inch thick. Obviously trimmed briskets cost more. The fat can be nice for smoking but the corned beef I have seen is not as fatty.

Fatty and mushy are not the same thing, of course. If the meat is actually mushy then I suspect that it was packed with a meat tenderizer as well as the corning salt and seasonings. If this is the case then there isn't much you could have done differently. Just don't buy that brand next time. Better yet, next time, corn it yourself.


How to balance out sourness of lemon juice, specifically in a mayonnaise?

To balance acidity, add sugar.  It's how most mayonnaise manages to be acidic enough to prevent bacteria growth (pH 4.6 or lower), while still having a balanced and edible flavor.

You might get an edible result with honey, but sugar is more of a neutral flavor, so I would use that first.  Using a jigger of Dijon mustard is not beyond the pale, as well... might help hide the acid, to a lesser extent.


Would replacing sugar with a sweetener affect bread dough fermentation?

The short answer is that it's probably safe, but here are some considerations:
What Does Yeast Do?
Yeast eats sugar and converts it to carbon dioxide (also alcohol, but that's not a consideration in most bread baking).  "Sugar" doesn't necessary mean sucrose (table sugar) - it also means fructose and glucose, like you'd find in honey or agave syrup.
If you don't provide the yeast with anything to eat, it won't produce any carbon dioxide.
Can Yeast Eat Stevia?
No.
Stevia is not any kind of sugar, nor can it be converted into sugar (more on that in a moment).
Does Leavened Bread Need Sugar (glucose/fructose/sucrose/lactose/maltose)?
No1
Many (most?) bread recipes do not contain any sugar - and yet they can rise impressively.  How does the yeast produce carbon dioxide if you don't add sugar?  The flour can feed the yeast.
Flour is largely starch, which is a chain of sugar (glucose) molecules.  Our digestive systems are powerful enough to break starch down into sugar, but yeast cannot do so.  Fortunately, the wheat berry itself contains the solution. An enzyme present in wheat berries (amylase) will break down the starch into sugar.  Once this happens, the yeast can eat the sugar and happily bubble away.

1 I had a note here about proofing active dry yeast, but this information is now out of date.
Active dry yeast has been reformulated. It's now in smaller particles and does not need to be dissolved in water. It can be added directly to the dry ingredients.  If your active dry yeast is nearing its expiration date, you can proof it by mixing it with warm water and a small amount of sugar.  This doesn't do much to affect the bread, but it does allow you to avoid baking with dead yeast.
https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/blog/2015/09/25/active-dry-yeast
Will Anything Else Happen If There's No Sugar?
Possibly - that is, some things will change, but you may not detect the change.
(Most of the rest of this information comes from this article - "How to reduce sugar in yeast bread".  Feel free to skip my summary and go straight to the source!)
The bread may be drier

when you reduce sugar in yeast bread, the only textural difference you might see is a tendency towards dryness.
Why is this? Sugar is hygroscopic; that means it attracts and holds moisture. Without sugar, moisture evaporates from bread during baking, creating a drier loaf. The more sugar you cut from a sweet yeast bread recipe, the more you’ll notice this effect.

Counter intuitively, it might speed up the dough's rise

Remember, sugar is hygroscopic. And in yeast dough, this means it can deprive yeast of the moisture it needs to grow. Ever waited impatiently for your sweet bread to rise? Blame the “arid” atmosphere

The bread may brown more slowly

Some of the sugar in yeast dough rises to the surface and caramelizes as bread bakes, yielding rich brown color

A Note about Acacia
A comment asks about acacia, otherwise known as acacia gum, or gum arabic.  As the Wikipedia article says, "Gum arabic is a complex polysaccharide," which makes it chemically similar to starch (also a polysaccharide).  But can amylase (or some other enzyme already present in the dough) break down this polysaccharide?  I would guess so, but here's where we come up hard against the limits of my high school chemistry education.


How to get falafel to hold together when pan-frying?

I used almond flour as an alternative and it worked pretty well. The perfect temperature is difficult at first but just keep trying....falafels are worth the efforts.


Describing the only method I know, and hoping that somebody will come up with an improvement, because this one is quite time-consuming.

First, clean your pumpkin seeds and toast them. They cling to the hull when they are raw. When toasting, it is preferable to use lowish temperature for a long time, so you can prevent strong taste changes and burning. If I remember correctly, it is also a good idea to let them cool them first, because they are more likely to break when hot, but

When the seeds are ready, you want to pop them out of the shell. For this, hold a seed between your thumb and index finger. Apply pressure to the most prominent parts of the edge.

Ideally, the pointed part of the hull will split along the edge, and the seed will fall out, or you will be able to squeeze it out. Even if it goes like that seed after, it is a slow, monotonous work. Often, the hull will refuse to split, or the seed will break within the hull, or it will cling to the hull and refuse to come out after it has split. And then there is no guarantee that you'll get the beautiful plump seeds you see in the supermarket, because carving pumpkins aren't bred for nice seeds, it can happen that yours are very small and thin and not a particularly good decoration.

Conclusion: it is possible, but even if I had the seeds sitting around, I'd throw them out (or feed them to birds outside) and get hulled seeds for cooking, instead of spending half a day to get a handful of seeds out of their hulls. If it doesn't bother you, or if you can find a more efficient method, feel free to do it and share your process improvements here.


Why is expired frozen chicken safe to eat?

It's safe because freezing greatly slows (if not completely arrests) the growth of the bacteria that would otherwise make the meat spoil. It doesn't kill them, it just puts them in 'stasis'. The expiration date is given based on the meat only being refrigerated. If you intend to store the meat past its expiration date, best practice is to freeze the meat ASAP, and to use it within 24 hours of defrosting.

The main hazard is in that defrosting. At no point should the chicken (any part thereof) be at room temperature for more than 2 hours. The safest method is to defrost the meat slowly in the fridge. You can also defrost it under cold running water, providing you keep it under the 2 hour mark.

Of course, you can also cook the meat straight from frozen. There is absolutely nothing wrong with doing this for small cuts like chicken breasts. Slicing and cooking a partially defrosted chicken breast is perfectly safe, especially as it often easier to make really thin strips with semi-solid meat. You just have to be extra careful that the meat is at a safe temperature (170°F/75°C).


Should a teabag or looseleaf tea brew at room to cold temperature water?

Yes, tea will brew at cold temperatures.  Growing up, we'd make sun tea by leaving it in a sunny window for about 8 hrs.  These days, I put it in the fridge to brew simply because you have a longer window before the more bitter flavors start getting extracted.

Tea bags will brew faster, as they tend to have smaller pieces and possibly dust in them, which means increased surface area.


What is 91/100 CV when referring to olives?

Olives are sized by "number of olives per kilogram" (or per pound, in the US). In this case the packaging is 500 grams, so I'd assume we're talking olives per kilo here.
91/100 olives mean that it will take between 91 and 100 olives in a kilo. There are additional requirements to ensure consistent sizing, so that there isn't a mix of golf balls and tiny olives in a given container.


Ratios for making Dashi from Kombu and Katsuobushi

Measure both with weight, start with a ratio you find to be tasty and produce varying kombu to katsuobushi ratios in equal steps, preferably 3 or 5 variations in small batches. Make sure to keep liquids, temperature etc. as much of a constant as you can.

Taste all, make notes and have others taste test them as well.
This process should be repeated each time the source of your katsuobushio or kombu changes.

Unless you live in Japan, consistency may be hit and miss.


How to use a bottom concave ebelskiver (Æbleskiver) pan on a glass cook-top stove?

You could consider heating it up, while empty, in an oven (I would go for, say, 200C/390F). Keep it there for at least 30 minutes: the transfer of heat from the air to the cast iron is not very efficient! Then take it out quickly, pour the batter in, and return it to the oven until done (and then make the next batch, if you're making multiple).

An issue with this could be that the Æbleskiver might cook too quickly from the top. You might need to experiment with the target temperature you leave the oven at.


How to cook better cookies despite a terrible oven?

As suggested by Catija, moscafj and Ecnerwal the first thing you want to do is get a oven thermometer to verify that the temperature you're setting is the one you're actually getting. If possible you might should to bring it back home to see how well your home oven is calibrated. It may be the case that your home oven is slightly off in one direction and your dorm in the other direction so you might need to make a bigger adjustment than just testing your dorm oven would indicate.

That said, it sounds like your problem is that you're leaving the cookies in the oven for too long. Chewy cookies are basically under cooked cookies, you want to take them out of the oven when they're golden brown on the outside while still soft in the middle. Differences in lighting and glass between your old stove and the new one might make it harder to judge when the cookies are done, causing them to appear less browned then they actually are. Also cookies will still cook a bit while cooling on the counter, hardening up, so you're aiming for cookies that are a bit less done than you want in the end.


Should a gas Aga be left on when not in use?

Looking at the economics angle the Aga is expensive to run. Energy prices in the UK (not sure where you are but most of the Agas I know of are there) are about £.15 per kWh. If an Aga uses 20,000 kWh of energy per year to run, which is a reasonable figure if it's on all day, it would cost £3000 per year. If you modernize it with a schedule to run 8 hours per day, say, it's £1000 per year. Those figures could be less with your model, exact information is hard to find.
If you scheduled it to only heat up for an evening meal then it's probably 4 hours per day, which would be about £500 per year with those energy estimates, which doesn't sound too bad, however that would limit you your flexibility.
A good quality new cooker (i.e. range in the US) costs about the same as 8 hours usage on an Aga for a year, and would be ready when you need it. Used Agas in good condition get around £3000 on Ebay, you could potentially sell it, buy something different and come out cash positive from the deal.
So Agas are expensive to run unless you need the heat from it, if you buy a programmer it can save you money, it's still probably more economical to replace it with something else. It all comes down to whether you like the Aga style of cooking, if you do then spend the money happily, if you don't it'll get snapped up on the used market faster than I wrote this.


Can soda bread be successfully frozen, either baked or in dough form?

Soda bread is a simple quick bread, all of which freeze quite well after being baked (most yeast raised breads do as well).

Wrap it well to prevent freezer burn—I like to use a large sized freezer-rated zip type bag for freezing breads.

You can also put some waxed paper or parchment between each slice to help you get them out without thawing the whole loaf.


How much cream should I make for my mini Oreo cream pies?

You could estimate by filling the cups with water about the level you want the cream to be at, then dumping into a big measuring cup. You'll end up with a bit of extra cream that way unless you compensate for the space the crust is going to take up, but wouldn't be too far off!


Are there differences when working with light-colored palm sugar versus dark?

The pale-colored disks of palm sugar have a mild taste, and can be used for any recipe which calls for palm sugar, or for that matter light brown sugar.  It's that not strongly distinct from granulated sugar in flavor; personally, the only reason I use it is for texture.

The dark brown palm sugar has a distinct caramelized, even somewhat burnt flavor.  It adds considerable, distinct, flavor to a dish, even a heavily spiced one.  You should use it in dishes which are specifically supposed to have a palm sugar flavor, but should be careful using it in recipes which say things like "Palm sugar or granulated sugar".

It's really like brown sugar vs. molasses.  Sometimes you can substitute them, but not always.

There are probably also ethnic differences in which one you want to use for what, but I don't have enough experience of Southeast Asian cuisines to tell you that.


That is such a shame, they looked wonderful.

You may well be able to save the not-so-burnt ones. But you'll have to check the burnt taste hasn't tainted the apple base.

I'd start by carefully removing the burnt bits, (as Dorothy suggested above) and inspecting / tasting the base.

To repair the crumble topping. Mix up a new batch and bake it on it's own. Then when it has cooled enough to handle brake it up and re-top the crumbles.

Rather than grilling/broiling you can get a small blow torch like the ones plumbers use. They are great for this and Creme Brulee. You have much more control.


I grilled my turkey this year, here is how I made the gravy:

Cut the wing tips off
Make a mirepoix (chopped carrots, celery and onions)
Brown the mirepoix really well.
Brown the neck, wing tips and giblets (but not the liver-fry that separately and eat it for a snack)
Simmer the mirepoix and browned meat bits in a few cups of water for an hour or more to make a rich stock.
Add browned mushrooms if you like (adds umami).

This can all be done while the turkey is being grilled.

When you take the turkey off, put it on a platter to stand.  You will collect some juices in the tray.  Use these juices and the stock you made to make the gravy.

See: Making a natural gravy?


Can I use 100% cotton bed linen as a pudding cloth?

If you wash them first, there's no reason you can't.  Muslin is just fabric.  It doesn't even necessarily need to be undyed (although it can matter what color the dye is), and doesn't necessarily have to be cotton (although some synthetics won't pass enough moisture).

It's fairly traditional for cooks to use an old pillowcase for boiled puddings.  According to a Regency Fiction blog, most 19th-century pudding cloths were linen bedsheet remnants.


Replace the mouthfeel of consommé in vegetarian soup?

Agar...derived from seaweed.  Used in McDonald's milk shakes because it's vegetarian and cheap, lab petri dishes and vegetarian cooking.  Doesn't have a flavour.  You can find it in health food stores but I think many grocery stores are carrying it these days.  Heat it up in water like gelatin and when it cools you have jelly.

You could use Arrowroot to give a slight thickening for texture or even cornstarch but I'm thinking those won't give you quite what you're looking for though Arrowroot will be closer.

I think there is a Chia seed gelatin too but don't have any first hand experience with it.  Chia seeds when soaked in water give off this thick gelatenous substance, very weird to see it happen.  Ask about it at the Health food store too.

Here's a website for a few more substitution ideas.

http://www.vegkitchen.com/tips/vegan-substitutions/

Good luck!


On its page, White Film On Cultured Vegetables, Cultures for Health identifies kahm yeast as the probable culprit. Many reference sites indicate that the food is safe to eat as long as mold is not present. The yeast film should be removed as it may affect the flavor of the food and it may adversely affect digestion.
Kahm yeast formation can occur because:

The batch is insufficiently acidic
There is not enough salt in the brine
The culturing temperature is too warm
The batch is over-exposed to oxygen
Good hygiene was not observed during preparation

You should be able to avoid kahm yeast formation in the future by following good lacto-fermentation procedures.


Why does broccoli turn brown when steaming?

Per the transcript of Alton Brown's Good Eat's episode If It Ain't Broccoli, Don't Fix It:

  Inside broccoli, nice, bright green chlorophylls are kept separate
  from acidic elements by cell walls. But if you overcook the broccoli,
  the cell walls can collapse, and the acids can attack, turning our
  nice, bright green chlorophylls into a sad, dingy gray.

This would let other pigments reveal themselves, turning making the appearance of your broccoli yellowish or brownish.  Your picture shows that the individual florets seem to be most effected, which are the smallest and easiest parts to cook on the broccoli.

So it may simply be an issue of overcooking the little florets.

Later in the transcript, Brown recommends a hybrid method of cooking, giving different treatment to the stalks and florets to minimize this effect.

According to The Happy Scientist, raising the pH with baking soda will prevent the enzymes from effecting the chlorophyll, but this would be difficult to apply when steaming, and of course it also would have the unfortunate side effect of turning the broccoli mushy.

Personally, I prefer to roast broccoli rather than steam it.   It is a little slower, but can be very effective, and of course, a different type of browning is somewhat expected :-)


You cannot view the full study, but the summary already tells you the results: http://journals.lww.com/joem/Abstract/1988/12000/Epidemiologic_Study_of_Workers_Exposed_to_Titanium.11.aspx

The objective of this study was to determine whether workers exposed to titanium dioxide (TiO2) had significantly higher risks of lung cancer, chronic respiratory disease, pleural thickening/plaques, or pulmonary fibrosis than referent groups.
A total of 1,576 employees exposed to TiO2 were observed from 1956 through 1985 for cancer and chronic respiratory disease incidence, and from 1935 through 1983 for mortality. A cross-sectional sample of 398 employees was evaluated for chest roentgenogram abnormalities.
Cohort analyses suggested that the risks of developing lung cancer and other fatal respiratory diseases were no higher for TiO2-exposed employees than for the referent groups. Nested case-control analyses found no statistically significant associations between TiO2 exposure and risk of lung cancer, chronic respiratory disease, and chest roentgenogram abnormalities. No cases of pulmonary fibrosis were observed among TiO2exposed employees.
(C)1988 The American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine

Note: Titanium always has a TiO2 layer above it, which is why your food won't get into contact with titanium directly (and if it does, it'll quickly oxidize to TiO2 again).
The result of that study is consistent with the fact that titanium is widely used for medical purposes like implants and dental fillings. Even pacemakers are made from titanium. It is not toxic, even in high doses and on permanent exposure (the medical "lifetime" of the titanium is somewhere along the lines of 20 to 30 years, without a single toxic effect ever linked to the titanium).
The only thing that is hazardous is titanium nano-particles. But the nano-particles of pretty much any element, including carbon, will be hazardous, so that doesn't count (it's not chemically toxic, the physical size is what makes it dangerous). You won't ever be exposed to nano-particles from using titanium cookware, so to answer your question: Yes, titanium cookware is completely safe. There are no cases of allergies recorded (at least I didn't find any) nor is it toxic.


You seem to be saying you have two issues: weak flavor, and watery sauce. There can be many separate causes for each, but one problem that causes both issues is a lack of reduction.

What are you doing to reduce the sauce down and concentrate it?
Are those the only 3 ingredients you are using?


Can I use an electric smoker without wood chips as an oven to cook a ham?

I wouldn't recommend it, but that said your ham by definition has already been cured and all you are really doing is heating it.

Smokers are optimized for smoking meats at a lower temperature than a traditional oven or fire. They use a combination of smoke and water moisture to make great moist smoked meat. You could easily make your own ham by taking a pig's leg bone and "smoking" it with or without wood chips.

You should always use a smoker outside, and not indoors. Why can I have an indoor pizza/wood oven, but not a BBQ or smoker? (or can I...?)

Happy Easter!


How to mince garlic efficiently without the garlic sticking to the sides of the knife?

As with franko's answer, the reason why you use salt (preferably sea salt) is that it helps to crush and mince the garlic whilst you are chopping.  If you are worried about too much salt in your diet, then do not use any other salt than what is used whilst mincing your garlic.  Like above, I don't understand why you have to discard what is on the knife, I am assuming that you have peeled your clove.  If you are worried about cutting yourself, simply scrape the side of the knife on the edge of the board, gather it up into a little pile and carry on mincing, a bit of chop chop, then scrunch down with the sea salt.

As an aside to this, though this was always my preferred method in the past, I have now taken to grating garlic with the very fine part of a cheese grater.  This not only takes a second or two but also you don't have to peel your clove as the skin is left on the top side of the grater, whilst the grated garlic is on the underside.


If your dough is very dry and crumbly, it needs more water.

Add a few mL to the dough when adding the beaten egg.


How do you make whole-wheat bread less crumbly? -- (Without adding gluten)

I have found the water roux or tangzhong method effective for 100% whole wheat bread, as it makes the texture less dense, and therefore less crumbly.

Also, you may simply be using too little moisture overall. Now that I'm baking bread for a 2 year old, whose tastes lean slightly less rustic in bread than mine, I've rediscovered high-hydration loaves, which, when baked at a lower temperature than my beloved crusty, chewy breads, are pretty suitable sandwich material.

Another strategy, if you want to embrace the density of whole grain breads instead of avoiding it, is to try the strategy employed by dense German multigrain or pumpernickel loaves, which often employ moist sweeteners (honey, molasses or sugar beet syrup), sometimes additional moist ingredients (apples, carrots) along with various nuts and seeds that offset the grains, sometimes alternate grains like rye or spelt, and moderately high hydration. A picture of one example can be seen here: http://www.chefkoch.de/rezepte/1168871222955627/Apfel-Karotten-Mehrkornbrot.html. Then you get a fairly chewy but reasonably topping-friendly bread. (Most German sandwiches using this type of bread are remarkably minimalist in comparison to contemporary American preferences, sometimes meant just as a take-along "second breakfast", and may only have a slice of cheese or salami, some butter and mustard on thin slices). The combination of factors makes for a moister-than-you'd-expect, less-crumbly-than-just-grain, dense bread.


How can my breadmaker made wholemeal bread taste less salty?

Salt is an important part of the baking process, as your breadmaker instructions will probably state.  Most/All bread makers will come with Recipes and probably tips or guidance on baking.
I did experiment with low salt recipes, but have not kept my notes on that. From memory I had the best results with about half the standard amount of salt, but usually disappointing results if I tried to go salt free. Basically the salt tends to inhibit the yeast, so if you just reduce the salt content the uninhibited yeast activity causes it to over-rise, and then collapse to result in a loaf with a convex instead of concave top.
You need to counteract this by reducing the amount of yeast, or otherwise juggling with the recipe. Also consider the amount of sugar and the initial temperature of the ingredients to get consistent results it is best to watch all of these factors and record your results.  Also  note what oil/fat/butter is used and whether if butter it is salted or unsalted.
Here are some internet links I found

Davids Blog  Salt-Free Breadmaker Bread. That has a wholemeal and a brown bread recipe both with no added salt.
http://www.bloodpressureuk.org/BloodPressureandyou/Yourlifestyle/Eatingwell/Yourfood/Salt-freebread another set of recipes, including wholemeal bread with no salt and suitable for a breadmaker machine.
This one is more of an explanation and discussion of the purpose of salt in bread-making https://www.weekendbakery.com/posts/salt-in-bread-baking-how-much-and-why/ Note in the UK there are recommendations to reduce salt content.
https://breadmachinerecipe.net/low-salt-bread-machine-recipe/  although I wonder if the yeast quantities should be teaspoons not tablespoons


I've started to make dairy free cheese for cafes but have problem scaling up?

It is probable that the blades on the bamix stick blender are contacting the interior of the pot occasionally and scratching some of the non-stick coating off, and that's the grey flecks you see in your cheese.


This most likely means waxy potatoes, typically white or red. In some contexts it might also mean you want small ones so that you can boil and serve them whole, but it doesn't look like that's the case here.

There are two main kinds of potatoes, starchy and waxy. Starchy ones (like russets) cook up fluffy and dry, desirable for things like baked potatoes and fluffy mashed potatoes, but are prone to disintegrating when boiled or mixed into potato salad, and can get waterlogged from over-boiling. Waxy ones (like most red and white potatoes) on the other hand stay relatively firm, making them good for boiling.

So "boiling potatoes" meaning "potatoes for boiling" would indicate waxy potatoes, and that's consistent with the recipes you linked to. For aloo gobi, you want firm ones so they don't fall apart when you mix it all up. For curries and stews, you don't want them to get waterlogged or fall apart. Fries are much easier to handle if they're not falling apart! And two of the recipes even mentioned red and white potatoes.


Convert cooking Shrimp and Vegetables in a foil-packet on a 400 degree grill for 25 - 30 minutes to an oven

400 degrees on the grill = 400 degrees in the oven. No need to make any adjustment.


Tomato paste is just tomatoes with the water removed, essentially.  I'd slice the tomatoes in half and roast them (cut side up) at 350 degrees F for an hour (this will concentrate the flavour nicely and you can add s&p/olive oil/herbs/garlic if you want).  Then mash them through a sieve or food mill to get a smooth consistency.  Then put that tomato puree in a pot and just boil them down until it's as thick as you want.  As it gets thicker, you'll need to stir it regularly to prevent it sticking to the bottom of the pot and burning.


Can I use apple cider vinegar instead of white wine vinegar for cooking?

It may slightly alter the flavor (maybe in a positive way!). It shouldn't cause any negative chemical problems in the recipe. I sub different vinegars regularly and I haven't had any troubles.


How can one clarify orange juice to clear orange flavoured gelatine?

You might try simple agar clarification.  Dave Arnold has written extensively on the technique.  Basically, you use agar to create an orange juice gel. Once set, you use a whisk to turn the gel in to curds.  Pour into a cloth, hang, and allow to drain. Done correctly, the orange juice will be clear.  You can google the technique.  It's fairly easy and doesn't take too long.  You can then manipulate that liquid in many ways.  This is not how marmalade is made, but it will allow you to clarify almost any fruit or vegetable based juice/puree without a centrifuge.


Will roasted pistachio nuts keep well in freezer?

Frozen pistachio nuts should be good for about one year; as nuts (roasted or not roasted) are low in water, mostly the benefit of freezing is to protect the fat content from rancidity.  You will want to make sure they are in an airtight container.

For convenience, I would shell them first, so you can use them directly when you take them out, and to save space in your freezer.

Of course, if you make them into ice cream,then you are unlikely to have any issues with them lasting very long.


I am going to slightly disagree with the other two answers.  First, here is an excerpt summarizing Alton Brown's opinion:

  The first step in learning how to cook with spices is learning where to find spices. Now here in America, we do have some indigenous spices: allspice, vanilla, chili peppers, all from here. But by and large, most of your culinary spices come from the other side of the planet. And in their journey from there to here, a lot of things can happen. Not all of them good. They pass through a lot of hands, and all those palms, you know, want to be greased a little bit, quality can go down.  So, if you're going to be a world-class spice cooker, you really should try to find yourself a world-class spice merchant. … I sure hope we've inspired you to set up a little spice trade of your own. Just remember: purchase whole spices, whenever you can, from a reliable purveyor—Internet or mail order are fine—and store those spices in a cool, dry, dark, airtight place. And don't keep them around too long. Two years tops for whole spices, and no more than six months for ground.

So, to summarize, the most important thing about buying spices is making sure they are fresh and have been stored properly during their transport.  That means buying from a purveyor whom you trust has properly sourced and handled the spices.  If you go to a specialty spice merchant, chances are they care enough to ensure the quality of their product, and they charge you more for the convenience of that guarantee.  If you shop at an ethnic market that buys imports its spices in bulk, that is okay, as long as the store has enough turnover to ensure that the spices are always fresh, however, you don't necessarily have the guarantee of freshness unless you trust the store owner.  Supermarket spices can be okay, as long as they are stored and dated properly.  These generally cost more not so much due to the willingness of buyers to pay more, but more due to the fact that there is a longer chain of wholesalers and middle men who all also want to make a profit.


How to prepare soup for an office potluck?

As suggested in comments (and in the USDA quotation below), the best option if you are cooking the soup ahead of time would be to cool it rapidly, then bring it to work and reheat it with a microwave if one is available.  Then add it to the slow cooker to keep it hot until serving time.  Most slow cookers are not equipped to reheat food within a safe timeframe.

More details: Most crockpots and slow cookers contain advice in their instructions explicitly against reheating food in them.  Major food safety organizations say similar things (see here for example). Instead, the USDA says:

  Reheating leftovers in a slow cooker is not recommended. Cooked food
  should be reheated on the stove, in a microwave, or in a conventional
  oven until it reaches 165 °F. Then the hot food can be placed in a
  preheated slow cooker to keep it hot for serving—at least 140 °F as
  measured with a food thermometer.

Soup is usually a good growth medium for bacteria.  And even soup that is boiled is not usually completely sterile: some bacteria can survive very high temperatures, often by going into a dormant state (e.g., a "spore" form) but then can reactivate when the soup is cooler and grow again.  That's why commercial food codes (like the FDA) have very strict regulations on cooling and reheating.  While those guidelines vary depending on the exact situation, one thing that is required for commercially reheated food is that it be heated to at least 165°F within 2 hours.  Most crockpots and slow cookers will not be able to achieve that with any significant quantity of cold food.

And that part of the food code is dependent on code-compliant practices for rapid cooling after initial cooking, as well as storage.  Presumably you will be transporting the soup to work, during which time it will also be unrefrigerated, which removes some time from that 2-hour clock as well.

For consumer recommendations, the FDA and USDA have a general procedure that you don't tend to want cooked food to remain in the temperature range from about 40°F to 140°F for more than 2 hours total.  And here "total" would mean adding both the time to cool the soup AND to reheat it.  It's very unlikely you could cool soup (even in an ice bath) and then reheat it to 140°F in a slow cooker all while spending less than 2 hours in that temperature range.

Some may see this as being overly cautious [See NOTE below], but the FDA has regulations for commercial cooking to avoid making large numbers of people sick.  I'd be extra cautious and follow the same recommendations that commercial kitchens follow when serving lots of other people.

NOTE: Now, I know some who read this will say, "I reheat food all the time in my slow cooker and never got sick."  Okay.  But first consider that many instances of food poisoning are minor gastrointestinal distress that may not appear for a couple days after you've eaten something that was off.  If that happens, you may be lucky that it wasn't worse.  Most cases of food poisoning luckily are minor, but they tend to happen more frequently than most people think.

But even if you're willing to take the chance for yourself at home, consider the unlikely scenario where a cooked dish makes a bunch of coworkers ill.  I personally wouldn't take that risk.


If roasting meat doesn't generate much juices, why do gravy recipes assume it does?

They may or may not assume a significant amount of pan juices and there are quite a few ways to get more than “just a bit”. Including low-quality meat, bad temperature control and other ways to extract the water from the meat. Unfortunately most are also ways to get dry meat, especially in lean cuts.
Fattier cuts are usually cooked a bit longer and to hotter temperatures in comparison, which will give the collagen time to “melt” and also create more juices as a side effect. The drippings will also contain more fat, than can be used for the roux to thicken the gravy.
There are also lots of recipes that “top up” the pan juices with stock, water or wine (your links both add stock), and small but concentrated amounts of pan juices can bring a lot of flavor to a gravy - just add liquid and boil all bits off the roasting pan, don’t just pour the liquid out of the pan. And finally there are also many ways to “cheat”, from simple box mixes to separately cooked sauces or jus made from bones and scraps.


Is using hot water to make chapathi dough a good idea?

Yes, using warm water helps keep the dough soft and also helps with the kneading.
Hot water denatures the proteins in the dough and also apparently makes it harder for gluten to form. I found this from this really beautiful video by Bong Eats. They recommend using boiling water to make the dough. I've tried it a lot of times, and it does work. It makes kneading easier, and the dough is softer.
Another tip: If you consume dairy, you can use a little yogurt while making the dough. That brings in the Lactobacillus bacteria, which slowly ferments the dough. That makes the chapathis soft and helps in keeping them soft for longer.


Why does a pizza stone make my pizza dough bread-like?

Your aluminum pan is allowing moisture to escape from the bottom and the top, whereas the stone does not, so the stone will have more rise.  To use a stone, after much trial and error, I have to roll that dough out super thin, like 3-4 mm, prebake in the hot oven for 4-5 minutes, pull it out, add the toppings, then finish for another 6-7 minutes.

Also, different flours will bring a different gluten content, which are the sticky bonds that will allow you to roll it thinner without it contracting at every roll.  I use 1/2 semolina flour and 1/2 plain flour, I can roll it thinner that way.

Be not dismayed, a breadier crust can be fantastic, you can load more stuff on it.


How does the varying amounts of ingredients in an English pancake affect its outcome?

More flour: Thicker, cakier

Less flour: Flatter, more custardy

More egg: Chewier

Less egg: Breadier

More milk: Flatter

Less milk: Thicker


Is there a spice that is hot and colorless?

Let a hot pepper (jalapeño or habañero, perhaps) soak in your liquid for however long it takes to achieve the desired hotness.


Halva smells like play-dough? a common ingredient?

Are you sure it was a sesame based Halva? Halva generally falls in to two wide varieties, one flour based and the other nut based. I would assume that the smell of play-dough comes from the flour. So it's possible you had a flour based one.

BTW, it's wikipedia that's defining Tahini as being nut based, I'm not so sure about that classification myself.


gluten free gnocchi tasting too much like potato

Is it cheating to put the cheese inside the gnocchi?

I've used grated hard cheeses to help take up some of the moisture from gnocchi before.  If you use cheese, plus some herbs or spices (nutmeg is pretty classic, a bit of rosemary might be nice as an alternative, or even lemon zest), it shouldn't taste like a baked potato.

I'd also be concerned with your choice of potatoes -- red potatoes around here tend to be a waxy potato.  I typically use a mealy (aka floury aka starchy) potato such as a russet for gnocchi, or an in-between potato, such as a yukon gold.


Substituting lime juice for lemon juice in hollandaise/mayonnaise?

Yes, it will work. The texture won't be different but the flavor will be significantly different. It will taste like lime hollandaise. :-P

I imagine a lime hollandaise would taste great on fish and other seafood. I'm not entirely sure what you would do with  lime mayonnaise though.


What is it that makes bacon so delicious?

The big missing thing in your description (fat, salt, smoke) is umami. You can see this in bacon-flavored products. For example, bacon salt (click on a "nutritional info" link) contains monosodium glutamate.

So if you want to make something bacon-flavored, short of using bacon (and possibly draining away a lot of fat), you're generally going to be looking for source of umami; see "What foods are high in umami?" or "What is a good vegetarian source of umami flavour?".

Also, bacon is definitely not acidic, and perhaps slightly sweet. This means, for example, tomatoes are probably not a good way to get the umami, and that whatever you do, you might try adding a tiny touch of sugar to bring out the flavor a little more. Things like shitake mushrooms and nori seem like better flavor matches. (If you've had furikake this shouldn't be too surprising.)


I'd say the buttermilk was a necessary ingredient that you shouldn't have left out. Milk usually needs to be inoculated with some kind of culture before your rennet (or lemon juice in this case) will successfully curdle it. Buttermilk is cultured (which means it has an active colony of beneficial bacteria), and would work well to inoculate your goat milk.

Leaving that out made the milk much more difficult to curdle, and left you with a less stable curd.


(International / UK / US) RÖMERTOPF equivalents?

I don't think there is really a US equivalent, but a Moroccan tagine would be close.


The muscle fibers of octopus are very thin compared to other species, arranged in multiple layers and alternating rings, which are then even further reinforced with collagen, 3-5 times more than regular fish muscle fiber. It's basically the reinforced concrete in the world of muscle fibers.

There are exactly two ways to get tender octopus:

Destroy the collagen by force or to cook it for a very long time like a stew
Barely cook it to a core temperature of not more than 130-135°F/55-57°C. At 140°/60° temperature the collagen layers will contract and you are screwed.

Note that these two methods generate edible octopus, but with different texture.

The wine cork serves no purpose. If it has any effect at all, it will negatively affect the destruction of the collagen, as tannin is actually used to cross-link, a process to make the collagen stable and durable, which is the complete opposite of what you want, when you want tender octopus.

References:
[1]: On Food and Cooking
[2]: Stabilization of Collagen by Its Interaction with Tannin
[3]: Tannin used for the conservation of leather by stabilizing collagen

As an unrelated side note, octopus and squids have the least flavorful flesh of all fish and molluscs, as they use Trimethylamine N-oxide for osmotic balance; which happens to be completely tasteless. Other species use tasty amino acids. Unless you happen to have one as free by-catch on your own fisherboat, there is not much reason to invest the time and costs to make a dish out of it.


All other things being equal (water, bean, grind, filter...) the "mechanical" effect of a bold setting is to constrict the flow rate so that the water is perculating with the coffee for a longer period, thus rendering a 'stronger' (or more bold) flavor. (see https://cooking.stackexchange.com/a/20202/6279)

If you feel like your coffee maker is 'stuck on bold' I would give the machine a thorough cleaning as the flow control is probably 'stuck'. I don't know that I would say clean after every use (if you use it daily...) but you are probably long overdue for a deep cleaning .


Chill this or any cookie dough once finished mixing and before baking. Make your biscotti dough into perfect rectangle logs right to the edge of your pan, with even height and width right across. Use a ruler if you have to. I suspect you have a higher height in the middle - that dough will need to go somewhere when heated, and that's sideways (creating your longer middle baked width).

Once you have these perfectly formed rectangles of dough, chill in the fridge for an hour at least. This will really help keep it's shape and reduce any uneven spreading during bake. You could also try slightly increasing your first-bake temp 10-15 degrees as this will help quick set the exterior of the biscotti logs. The only other thing I may mention is the recipe - perhaps you can just slightly scale back the baking powder to help reduce the spread of the dough during baking.

Once baked just to set (depends on size), pull from the oven and let cool just slightly. While still warm to the touch, start slicing your cookies to a consistent, even desired width - I really recommend using an electric knife if you have one to make the work a lot easier for yourself. If you don't have one, just work quickly with your best serrated knife. Doing this while still warm will definitely help with reducing breakage and crumbs.


The warmer the dough is during fermentation, the faster the yeast multiply and produce carbon dioxide (carbon dioxide production rate maxes out at around 90°F). So with very simple recipes, this entire process can take place in just a few hours.

Experienced bakers and pizza-makers know that this is not the best way to make dough. Though yeast produces carbon dioxide rapidly at high temperatures, it also produces undesirable flavors. Rather than tasting rich and complex, hastily made breads have the one-dimensional flat flavor of the flour, and sometimes even develop off flavors, like sour milk.

Retarding a dough is the act of placing it in a cold environment after it's mixed in order to slow down the activity of the yeast. At cool fridge temperatures, yeast behaves differently, producing more of the desirable flavor compounds and fewer of the sour ones. It also produces carbon dioxide more slowly.

Texture is also improved: Long fermentation times give the enzymes present in the flour more opportunities to cleave proteins (a process known as autolysis), making it easier for them to untangle, straighten out, and link up into gluten. Gluten structure is improved. Finally, the colder the dough when you shape it before the final proof, the fewer bubbles are forced out of it.


Newly seasoned carbon steel pan sticks when cooking

High temps and flaxseed oil (essentially linseed oil) don't mix so I'd be suspicious of using flaxseed oil for seasoning. Try using a different oil and see what happens. The baked coating may then be less sticky/grabby.


Temperature for dutch oven curry with venison

In Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's river cottage cookbook, he says -and I fully agree- that venison, along with most game, should be minimally marinated in acidic things like lemon or vinegar as it gets pickled, hence tougher. He then makes a case for game being better and softer when braised rather than marinated.

Scottish venison definitely works like above, unless you have a very prime cut or the liver which are better eaten bloody. I would either forget about the curry and eat the prime cut with minimal spices/processes or I would follow the mantra brown-deglaze-braise if I had a stewing cut. It sounds like your curry would be ideal for the latter so why not just do that? Brown the meat in small batches in your dutch oven over very high heat so as not to get the meat boiling - it will stick off the hot surface when it wants to be turned. Then use some neutral alcohol to deglaze (or experiment if you feel like it - I had a beef stew I deglazed with port and south Indian lemon rice worked incredibly well with it!).

Finish with your curry recipe in 120 Celcius for however long it takes for the venison to be melt-in-your-mouth tender (for small size chunks 3-4 hours should be OK).


Is "swimming in broth" a common cooking technique for pasta and broccoli rabe?

I am not sure whether it is a common way to prepare it in the US, but I would say that it is definitely not the traditional Italian way to serve pasta salsiccia e friarielli which is instead a fairly dry pasta dish.

Of course nothing stops you from making variations on the theme. For instance, I know some people who purée the broccoli rabe.

However, in Napoli (where the dish is from) you would generally have it dry.


Beurre Blanc and Beurre Monte difference

The beurre blanc is a final sauce whereas the beurre monte is more of an intermediate sauce for poaching, basting and on occasion, finishing.

Beurre monte is basically just melted butter with a more homogeneous composition that makes it more suitable for poaching or basting than melted butter (that separates).


In principle, I don't see why you couldn't take the flour to safe temperatures just like any other food. You'd have to reach temperatures which break down proteins, something like 165 F or 75 C should be sufficient (it's good enough for meat).

This will break down the proteins in the flour too, so I would expect it to behave like standard browned flour (although browned flour is taken to higher temperatures than that). It won't be suitable for making doughs and batters, or at least will perform much worse. You can use it for not-completely-white roux, or for fermenting bosa, or any other standard use of preheated flour.


Flavour espresso with vanilla without adding sugar or other sweetener?

You just add any vanilla-tasting product to your coffee. It doesn't have to be a sugared "coffee flavor".

The best option should be plain vanilla extract. Then you have synthetic vanilin, which comes as a white powder or in tiny vials of propylene-glycol solution. As it is very concentrated, it ends up being much cheaper than the extract, but its smell is nowhere as rich as that of real vanilla extract.

I suppose that you could also use real vanilla pods. I would cut off a piece, cut it open, and place it within the ground coffee during brewing (if you think it will interfere too much, you can also just scratch out the seeds and use them, but you will be throwing out lots of vanilla that way). I have never done it, so I don't know how big a piece you will need for the taste to be reasonably strong. I suspect that using vanilla extract will be more economical, as vanilla usually needs time to give off aroma, and the short espresso brewing time, even with the pressure, will need a fairly large chunk to make a difference in taste. Still, the pressure-brewed vanilla will have a different taste profile than the alcohol-dissolved vanilla extract, so if you are not happy with the taste the extract gives, this is one more method to try out.


Is there a way to save cookies that were baked without flour?

Once it's baked that's really it, re-baking them will likely ruin them. Why not make drop cookies and put them in the fridge? They'll keep for most of the week that way.


A partial answer, to narrow down the possibilities.
I am pretty sure it's not overbaked. I have had overbaked fish, and while it does get dry, it doesn't get tough and rubbery. Rather, it starts falling apart, and the overall texture is quite chalky.
The "puckness" you describe does sound like it lost moisture in some ways, "rubbery as to be unchewable" and the comparison to cartilage are quite like the leathery quality of dried out fish.
The first culprit I am thinking of is freezer burn. If you didn't wrap the pieces perfectly during rethawing, and maybe even if you did, you may have gotten them freezer burned, or in this case I guess you could call it freeze-dried (although intentional freeze-drying would have used different conditions and would result in a different texture). This can readily account for the observed effect. The one detail that doesn't fit the hypothesis is your statement that the ends were better off than the middle - normally, the thinner a piece of fish, the more likely that it will dry out into that leathery state.
The second would be the rethawing itself. Normally it shouldn't have such drastic effects, but maybe you just had some kind of bad combination of conditions, or simply bad luck. I still find it less likely than the freezer burn explanation - while rethawing does cause a kind of dryness, it also contributes to mushiness, which is the opposite of the glued-together state you describe. But maybe it was the combination of freezer burn and rethawing such that each made the other worse.


What effect would replacing the egg in a pie crust with egg whites have?

I would say that the effects will be too minimal to notice. So if you want to do it, go ahead and use up your egg whites.
Theoretically, egg yolks provide some emulsifying powers, and lead to softer, richer, sometimes even slimier doughs, while egg whites increase binding more and give you drier doughs. This can be quite noticeable in egg-rich cake types such as genoise or in yeast-leavened cakes. But in the case of a pie crust, it is almost completely made up from flour and butter, with the liquid needed only so you end up with a ball of dough with a bit of gluten, and not a bowl of crumbles.
The standard American crust uses water as the liquid in this type of dough, but when it is used for making shortbread cookies in European recipes, it frequently has an egg instead. I don't remember seeing eggs in tart crusts, maybe it is present in the Alsace. These doughs are not bad to work with, but with the small amount, and especially with flaky crusts deriving their texture from the butter pockets, I doubt that eaters will know that much of the difference. You certainly don't get a strong yolky mouthfeel when you use a whole egg, and with the crust being very fatty anyway, the missing yolk will be even less noticeable. So you are quite free in your choice of liquid, including egg white.
As a side note, if you are doing gluten-free crusts, you do need all the extra binding you can get, so there pure egg white is preferred over whole eggs or water.


You may very well be able to make that system work for you, but in the two fine-dining restaurants I've worked, the system is less paperwork-intensive and more common-sense. It is based on organized storage, adding new product where it will be used after the old, and labeling.  This lets you see at a glance what you have and how old it is, rather than having to constantly maintain an up-to-date inventory list.  It also makes it easy to find what you want.

The system works like so:

Organize your storage so food goes in the same spot every day.  This way you can see at a glance what you have and what you need.  It also makes it easier to find things.
New food of the same type goes behind the old stuff, and isn't opened until the old product is used up.  This prevents you from discovering the dreaded Green Milk lurking at the back of the fridge.
ALWAYS label prepared food with the date, using masking tape and a permanent marker. Make sure the label (or container's expiration date) is toward the front.  You don't want to have to sniff-test old food. Trust me.
Store in clear containers, so you see how much is left.
Inventory perishable foods before purchasing more.
Toss spoiled or questionable food promptly.  This prevents "unpleasant surprises," and avoids contaminating nearby stuff.
Cool food as fast as possible, to prevent bacterial growth.  Hot water holds a lot of heat, so it gets pre-chilled in an ice water bath; otherwise it can stay warm and breed bacteria for HOURS.  Containers can be left open for an hour or two in the fridge to cool contents faster.

At home, I use a very similar system, with a few modifications:

Pre-packaged containers get labelled with an opened-on date, because usually this determines when they spoil more than the expiration date.
Expiration dates are just rough estimates.  StillTasty provides more detailed information, but I don't refrigerate any kind of leftover more than a week.  High-protein foods, or things with egg in them get less time.
If it smells even a little off, it's probably unsafe, with the exception of milk and produce.  They will only make you WISH they could kill you.
Only buy produce you can use before the next grocery run... unless it's really cheap and can be used up easily.  Yes, fresh tomatoes are amazing to cook with.  They're slightly less awesome when half of your 5 pounds spoil, unused.
Don't buy fresh meat or fish without a specific meal plan, or at least a schedule for use. This prevents these expensive, perishable foods  from sitting in the fridge and spoiling.  This doesn't have to be a detailed day-by-day meal plan, but the minute you take to think before buying prevents impulse buys and helps make sure you'll have the time and ingredients to cook the food before it goes bad.

I know the last point can be difficult, but remember that a meal plan might be no more than "make myself a nice steak over the weekend."  The idea is to avoid buying meat on Sunday that you won't have time to cook until next Friday.  If you have to, buy meat right before cooking a nice meal; at least then it will be fresh.  Freezing is also a good backup plan, but only if done fairly early.


What does it mean if my chicken tastes like fish?

I can think of several things, but it's not the definitive answer (not enough info in the question):

Oven was used recently for baking fish
Dish/pot was used recently for baking fish
Chickens were fed food containing fish. I don't know if this still happens, but in my country (The Netherlands) some 30 years ago, you could buy a 'powdery' chicken food that was some mix of ground-down grains, corn, and fish serving as a cheap protein source. You could definitely taste that in the eggs - I don't remember about the chicken meat itself.Note that chicken meat is sort of 'lowest on the rung' where quality is concerned, and maybe this was a batch from someone looking for a quick profit.

Note that the smell of fish permeates/overpowers quickly and that taste is very much determined by smell.


What is the English name for Chitra Rajmah?

Pinto beans.  Throw in a few more foods in Hindi, and I'll translate them too, while I'm here; I've got good reference books handy with names in both English and Hindi.


How does gelatin interact with grease (fat)?

Gelatin works by creating a very fine mesh of proteins, between which the (hidrophilic) liquid gets trapped.

A mixture of fat and water isn't a liquid. It can be either a rough two-phase mixture, with visible fat droplets swimming around in the water, or it can be an emulsion, with invisibly small fat droplets dispersed through the water. Emulsions appear smooth, e.g. milk.

When you try to use gelatine on the mixture, two things can happen. In an emulsion, the fat droplets can be smaller than the protein mesh. Then they get trapped as well as the water, and the result is gelled emulsion, just like you'd expect.

But if you have big globules of fat, they can't be trapped between the proteins. So it looks like they got squeezed out of the mesh and bubbled up to the surface, if it hadn't been there all along. On the surface, gelatine molecules couldn't find each other between globules of fat to crosslink, or maybe the motion of the globules broke any nascent links in the small amount of water between them, so it couldn't gel. So the conclusion is: you can't set soup/stew with gelatine. (I know that concentrated stock hardens from its own gelatine, but it has the fat filtered out first).

On the practical side, if you want to have thick stew juice, you have to use something else than gelatine. It is probably simplest to create an olive oil based roux with the stew juice. Or you can gel with xanthan. Both will result in a "juice" which is creamy, instead of solid wobbly blocks of juice, with xanthan retaining the authentic taste and a roux-based sauce being a novel variation.

If it is real jelly you are after, you'll have to emulsify first and use gelatine after that. Xanthan itself should emulsify well, or you can probably use lecithine. AFAIK, there is no problem to use lecithine and gelatine together, but somebody with more experience in gelling agents should confirm that. In any case, emulsifying will lead to your liquid getting quite opaque. This is inavoidable, as it has to do with the way the collection of individual micro fat droplets break and reflect light rays.


Ground beef does not work well in any traditional stir-fry or soupy dish, though there are probably one or two that actually call for it

But it does work well, and is actually used in China for stuffed items. Some deep fried or steamed pastry rolls ("dim sum") or steamed buns have some ground beef in the filling

In my experience it was a very coarse grind, and unlike the typical western butchery grind

I have seen a form of a "scotch egg", and hard boiled egg, wrapped with a smooth layer of chilies, herbs, and ground beef, and baked until set. Served cold, but very hot!

It is also used for some kinds of BBQ skewers (kebab style), more predominantly in the Muslim areas (which are limited). Some skewers are actual edible vegetables; like stems of choy sum, or a sort of asparagus etc. All very nice!

Of course, you can get all this in Pork, Chicken, Lamb, Goat, or whatever else moves in China

Examples

Beef Roll (like an English 'Sausage Roll' with light pastry)

Beef "String" (on right, like middle eastern kebab, but totally different herb taste)

Beef Steamed Bun


Xanthan gum and methylcellulose both are used in such small amounts that any carbohydrates in them would be of miniscule quantity.


What is the difference between green, white and black tea?

White, green, oolong, and black tea are all products of Camellia sinensis leaves and buds, the only difference is how they are processed.  You can turn the plant matter into any of the varieties.  Different sources will give different accounts of the processing steps, but in rough order of least-to-most processed:

White tea is minimally processed and not oxidized, meaning it retains the natural antioxidants, but does not develop as much flavor, color, or caffeine.  Sweet or flowery flavors are characteristic.
 (Chinese Silver needle white tea)

Green tea has a minimal amount of oxidation, halted by additional pan-frying (Chinese teas) or steaming (Japanese) steps.  The additional processing brings out more flavor, and allows for caffeine to develop, at the cost of a reduction in antioxidants.  Characteristic flavors are grassy, vegetal, and earthy, with sweet notes.

 (Japanese Sencha)

Oolong tea gets partial fermentation, and often an additional shaking/bruising step that release additional flavors.  Oolong can range in color from dark green to black. The combination of bruising and partial fermentation give many oolongs distinct flowery & earthy flavors.  Darker oolongs may have buttery or smoky tastes to them.  It has somewhat more caffeine and less antioxidants than green tea.

Tieguanyin or Iron Goddess: (light oolong)

Black Oolong: (Wu Yi)

Black tea is fully fermented, which blackens the leaves and causes the formation of caffeine and tannins. It generally possesses the most robust flavor and highest level of caffeine, but the least antioxidants.

 (Chinese keemun)

Pu-erh is tea that is pressed into cakes and post-fermented, meaning that after processing and drying it undergoes an additional ripening/fermentation. Microorganisms work on the tea, changing it chemically in a similar fashion to aging cheeses.  Traditionally this is accomplished over years in controlled climate conditions (10-15 years being ideal), but in recent decades a several-month fast ripening process is sometimes used.

Pu-erh develops a richer, more complex flavor, and has the widest range of flavors of any of the varieties. Before post-fermentation, it may resemble a white, green, or oolong tea, but the ripening process can impart darker black-tea flavors, giving a unique character.

Pu-er Cake

Rooibos, sometimes called red tea, is made from another plant entirely, Aspalathus linearis.  It is a traditional South African infusion, prepared like a black tea but without caffeine. There are two varieties, green and red.  Green is un-oxidized, where red is oxidized.  Rooibos is characterized by a sweet, woody/malty flavor.  Health-wise, it is a source of anti-oxidants, may aid in digestion, and some say it may aid with nervous tension and allergies.

Yerba mate is from the South American plant Ilex paraguariensis, whose leaves are steeped like tea.  It is generally toasted in processing, and produces a brew with caffeine similar to coffee.  Despite its caffeine, mate is actually relaxing to smooth muscles, so you don't get jitters, and it also helps control appetite. The flavor is vegetal and herbal, and can be bitter if brewed hot. Although it contains antioxidants, this is balanced by traces of carcinogens from the toasting, and the jury is still out on whether mate overall increases or decreases cancer rates.

Tisanes or herbal infusions these are various blends of dried herbs, fruits, spices, and flowers which are steeped like teas, but do not contain tea leaves.  Generally, the ingredients are dried, although fresh ingredients can be used too.  To confuse matters further, black and green teas may also have flavorings added to them, giving a similar result.


"Shelf"-life of frozen Kaffir lime leaves

Answering from personal experience:
Mine are in the freezer now for 5+ months, and don't show any sign of degradation. Not in smell, not in texture, not in color, not in taste. I expect them to be like that for some time to come.


Is Casu Marzu illegal in the United States?

You ain't going to get anything like that into the states legally - not with the chance of livestock still being viable in there. It doesn't need pasteurising,it needs paralyzing before it will get past US customs.

You might get some included as a component of a cooked product, if the paperwork assures customs it doesn't actually cause death.

If you want a strong tasting cheese, try looking for Vieux Lille.


This article says it's not air and water: the squeakiness is caused by rubbing against the network of protein strands in the curds, and the squeakiness fades over time because the protein network deteriorates.

With respect to microwaving, it says:

  The reason microwaving helps reinvigorate some of the squeakiness is that the heat starts to alter the amount of moisture trapped inside the curds and creates another bout of hydrolysis, dropping more negatively charged hydrogen ions from casein proteins while they bind to the internal heating water.

I'm inclined to believe this because it explains why cheese curds are different from, say, cheese, and it's a more detailed explanation consistent with the article cited in Laura's answer (saying the protein networks are more elastic when fresh), which also explains the effect of the microwave!


"Watery, grassy and bland" and "not mushy/creamy" (a.k.a hard) match my experience of avocados that aren't sufficiently ripe. An avocado should be very soft and creamy when it's ripe. (But not brown/grey/gross - that's over-ripe.)

At least in Israel, avocados are sold somewhat unripe, since that prolongs their shelf life, and because soft ripe avocados bruise much easier than rock-hard unripe ones. If you buy an avocado that isn't ripe yet, you should wrap it in some newspaper, and leave it out of the fridge until it's ripe. depending on how unripe your avocado is, that can take a week or more.

I'm afraid I don't know the names of American Avocado varieties, but my experience has been exactly the same with the green smooth-skinned elongated ones, small black rough-skinned ones that peel easily, and roundish, leathery-skinned green ones. When ripe, they all taste pretty much the same.


I would squeeze a lemon over the fish when it was done, and then make a sauce for it. You can do like an Aioli or flavored mayonnaise, using ingredients such as capers, dill, lemon etc.. whatever you would normally like on regular cooked salmon.

Also, you will find a difference in taste between a farm raised and wild-caught salmon. Wild caught salmon have redder flesh (although some places have started dyeing farmed salmon), and have a much stronger salmon flavor than farm raised salmon.


My mother taught me to insert bits of garlic into slits made into the flesh of the roast before searing and then cooking it, something like what's described here.

Some people like cloves in there as well, though I more prefer that with bbq pork. For lamb, it's garlic and green olives. So, accordingly, you should be able to get creative and experiment with injecting some other things so the roast will take on flavors you prefer.


These are enamelled pots - perfectly fine and intended for cooking, albeit a bit sensitive to chipping if not handled carefully. You can find various listings of that exact set on the Internet, e.g here or here.
Enamel is a hard, glass-like, non-porous substance and pretty non-reactive. As long as you are not exposing it to extreme temperature changes (when it can crack like glass) or excessive scrubbing, it remains pretty much the same even with prolonged use. So buying them secondhand is a good investment, if they are in a good condition. Do not use enamelled pots with chipping, less because of the rust from the iron core, but because in that case there’s a (small) chance of enamel shards or splinters ending up in the food. With good care however, enamel pots can be used a long time.
Note that the surface is quite hard and scratch-resistant, so not bad per  se and reasonably well to clean. It’s not non-stick, though, so you will want to use a bit of fat if you intend to fry or roast something in them. Some cooks like the light inside color, because it makes it easier to judge the color, e.g. when browning onions.


How to absorb/remove excess water that you've added to a dish?

Stuff happens to us all, especially when using highly scientific methods. If your seasonings/flavors are the way you want them and the only issue is too much liquid, just ladle out until you are left with amount of liquid you want.

You can even save the seasoned liquid you take out (stored in refrigerator) and use it later when preparing another dish.


I think using an empty can is a brilliant, frugal idea...but if you want something a bit more exciting, chain stores like Bed Bath & Beyond sell decent tubs of cookie cutters. If you have one of those mailer coupons, you can get a ridiculous amount (like a pack of 100) for less than $20.


We buy large cans at home just like you do. We prevent it from spoiling by freezing it. Stored in the freezer the paste stays good for months, it's just a matter of correct storage.

What we do is the following: spoon a portion into a plastic bag -> twist the bag around several times -> tie off with a tierib (we use the thingies you get in the package with the bags themselves) and then repeat until done.

Every time you want to use the paste, just cut off a portion from the sausage-like string you will have.

Other options include using icecube trays, but we don't prefer that due to the small size of the cubes and the fact that the trays don't have a lid.


Can I counteract bitterness in apple sauce?

There's a similar question on here about soup, and part of the advice holds true -- try spooning small amounts out into cups, and experiment with various things that are known to help mask bitterness (salty, sweet, and sour), and whichever works best use for the whole batch.

I wouldn't recommend dairy for apple sauce, though.


In general, yes, you can bake stuff hidden inside a cake, but you are constrained in some ways. And before I go on: I don't believe that they actually baked a jumper in a cake for the film, they probably used some kind of inedible prop.
The most important constraint is the ratio of cake to item. If you embed something in a cake, you are messing up with leavening. It won't hurt if it is a small thing, or multiple small things, e.g. having nuts spread in the dough. But in this scene, the jumper was quite large. It was basically almost all jumper, with a tiny crust of "cake", and the cake itself was huge. It would be very difficult to bake a cake of this size all in one go even without the added difficulty of having a jumper in it, when you see huge wedding cakes, they are baked as separate layers, and the layers assembled afterwards.
I could imagine trying to get this to work. I would first choose a jumper that has as little weight and volume as possible, probably a girls' lightweight sweater. Or consider whether a doll sweater will be good enough for people to get the joke. If it has to be adult-size, maybe you can get away with a long-sleeve-T-shirt or a hiking base layer, especially if the fabric looks knitlike enough. Then find a suitable pan, large enough, and use a cutout baking mat on the bottom (you will never get it out with normal means if you do what I am planning). Parbake a very thin first layer for the bottom, Prinzregententorte-like. Then place the sweater on top, pour enough batter around it to get another layer, and bake the whole thing, using more top heat than bottom heat. Once this layer is set (doens't have to be through), add one more layer and rebake. When you get thick enough, I would suggest also starting to use a waterbath that only comes up to the height of the already-baked layers. You are finished when you have enough cake on top of the sweater.
The process will probably need several runs to be optimized. If the air in the sweater messes with leavening, consider soaking it in vegetable oil first. I'll also bet on you having to level the top, because it is unlikely you will get an even surface with this barbaric way of baking it and a whole sweater inside. It means that you probably don't want to serve it naked, since it will not resemble a plain cake out of the pan. You will likely need some kind of all-over frosting to cover the cut-off top and the unevenly baked layers on the sides.
Sweaters are also absorbent, so you will have to play with the liquid ratio in the cake. If using a dry sweater, you will have to make the batter more liquid, if you soak it in oil, you might need more flour in the cake (also, flour your sweater well before placing it in the cake, regardless of whether dry or oily).
You will have an easier time out of it if you use a packaged sweater, especially if you can package it in something with firm boundaries and nonreactive, such as a cookie tin or canning jar. You'll have some trouble finding a canning jar that has the proper shape, but maybe Weck has something appropriate, or you could consider using a modern glass-with-bamboo-lid storage container, they are available as squat cylinders. But I realize this may be too far from the original to get the joke across.
Finally, consider the sweater material. You can't have any amount of synthetic fiber in there, it will melt. This includes any kind of viscose too, even when sold with the label "natural" (may be labelled rayon, modal, lyocell, bamboo, etc.) I am torn between recommending wool and cotton - cotton is way too absorbent and heavy and will mess with the cake engineering more, but wool is not only expensive, wet wool exposed to heat usually felts. It is unusual in that you are not moving it here, but still it will probably feel pretty strange after baking. Other animal fibers are probably too expensive anyway, and unlikely to fare better than wool - although you may try alpaka because it felts less. Getting a lightweight sweater in non-fluffy alpaka might be difficult though.  Silk will also be an interesting option, I'm pretty sure you will have to look a jumper made with cablé or tape yarn though, not spun silk. Since it is so hard to predict, you will probably have to bake swatches before deciding on an optimum material (a tray of mini-jumper-cupcakes as a rapid prototyping method!).
Bottom line, to get the promised movie effect - it can be done, although I can't guarantee how close to the original you can get in the end, you will certainly have more cake on the outside. You will also need to invest some serious engineering effort, and money.

If you decide to go the cutout route, it's not trivial for that size either. I recommend that you watch videos on constructing pi~nata cakes.


How large does an oven need to be to fit a 18 lbs turkey?

The oven in a standard 20" kitchen stove will accommodate a bird even as large as 20 lbs (9 kg).

The very detailed chart here, the pertinent details of which are replicated in the chart below, establish the standard dimensions of such an oven as 18 X 16 X 14.5 inches (46 x 41 x 37 cm).

In their downloadable Thanksgiving pdf, for a turkey as large as 20 lbs (9 kg) Williams-Sonoma recommends a 16 X 13 X 3 inch (40 x 33 x 7.5 cm) roasting pan. A pan of this sort is available with a rack which rises just above the bottom of the pan, as here and pictured below.

This kind of pan keeps height requirements down to roughly the height of the bird plus 3" (7.5 cm) above the bird, plus the standard 2.5" (6.5 cm) below the bottom rack. With 14.5" (37 cm) worth of oven height to work with and about a half inch space between the bird and the pan, that still leaves room for a bird 8" (20 cm) tall. (We won't expect the bird to be half as tall as the pan is long.) Meanwhile, an 18" (46 cm) oven depth accommodates a 16" (41 cm) long pan, and a 16" (41 cm) oven width a 13" (33 cm) pan width. Also, as seen here and below, the pan's handles fold down.

Now, none of this is to say that there's anything the slightest bit convenient about roasting so large a bird in so small a space. But it can be done. It should just be done with every whit of safety in mind.


How can I find out if yeast or yeast producing are present in foods?

There are no "yeast-producing" ingredients - either you have yeast present or not.

Yeasts are fungi that live on many plant-based ingredients. Whether they will multiply depends on the environemental conditions.

Without discussing medical aspects (which are clearly off-topic here), you might expect natural yeasts on the skin of most fruit and grains, they are the reason that these can be fermented1 without adding yeast from another source. Heat kills live yeasts, but the required temperatures are different depending on the strain. Classic baking yeast starts to die at around 50°C for example, boiling your food should eliminate them.

And then theer are the typical foods that have yeast added, which are baked goods and alcoholic beverages. Many of these are heated, thus killing he yeast, but not necessarily so for some beers and some (young) wines may still contain a few live cells. A dietician should be able to answer this in detail.

1 e.g. in the production of alcoholic beverages like wine and beer or for sourdough in baking


Has anyone successfully spatchcocked their Thanksgiving Turkey?

I've spatchcocked our turkey the past two years and will never go back to the usual way. It just cooks so much faster. The spatchcocking itself isn't to hard, although you do have to be willing to inflict a little violence on the turkey.

I basically follow Mark Bittman's recipe. The video is located here. I do, however cook a larger bird. The time I did it with an 18 pound bird it too a bit more than 90 minutes.


Oxtail soup - oxtail tightened up during simmering?

A common braising time for oxtails would be on the order of 2-4 hours.

Oxtails are a tough cut of meat, with a lot of connective tissue made of a protein called collagen.  It needs to cook in a hot, moist environment in order to hydrate into gelatin.

This process happens over time and temperature.  Typically, braising is on the order of 200 degrees F (93 C), give or take, in order to get the expected tender product in the expected time.

If your oxtails have not become tender already in the 5 hours you have already given them, perhaps your slow cooker's low setting is not hot enough.  This is of special concern because you also want it to be at least 140 F (60 C) for safety.

I strongly urge you to use an instant read thermometer and measure the temperature at several places within the pot.  If it is not above the safety threshold, you should discard the contents, which would have been essentially incubating for the entire time.

If it is lower than the desired braising temperature, you can try your high setting, or transfer your braise to the oven (if the crock is oven safe, or in another covered oven safe pot such as a dutch oven).  Oven braising is usually done at about 350 F (180 C), which should bring the contents up to the desired braising temperature.

In any case, an expected cook time of 20 hours seems excessive by a factor of about 4 times.

Note also:  if your goal is to produce beef stock for the soup rather than tender, delectable meat, you want the temperature up around a slow simmer, which is about 200 F (93 C), although at the end, the flavor will have gone from the meat into the broth.  Even for stock making, I cannot imagine a cook time being required in excess of more than 8-12 hours.


Salvaging a cheesecake that's oozing butter

I would suggest using a bit of simple syrup or maple syrup instead to melt the chocolate, if you want the taste of butter, add a little bit of flour to the butter first when melting it to make a little bit of a light roux.

The problem is the chocolate and butter for sure will separate at the temp that a cheesecake bakes at, there's nothing for the butter to cling to.


Does the "German" in "German chocolate cake" refer to the chocolate or the cake?

A Baker's (now owned by kraft foods) employee named Sam German developed a chocolate recipe that was sweeter than semi-sweet chocolate, as well as containing a blend of chocolate liquor, sugar, cocoa butter, flavorings, and lecithin. Baker's honored Sam by naming the chocolate that he created Baker's German's Chocolate.

In 1957 the recipe was published in a Dallas newspaper, although nobody is sure exactly when the recipe was originally created. Generally Foods - who had bought the brand - noticed that alot of people liked the recipe and started a PR campaign for German's Chocolate using the recipe. They started sending it to newspapers all over - and people liked it. At some point the "'s" got dropped from the name, introducing all of the confusion we have about the origin of the cake today.

References:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_chocolate_cake
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Baker_%26_Company
http://www.joyofbaking.com/GermanChocolate.html


You can use garam masala to make curry, but it doesn't contain everything needed for a typical curry. Other ingredients are required.

Garam masala typically contains cumin, coriander, black pepper, cloves, cinnamon, bay leaf, and mace (the outer casing of nutmeg). It's a basic spice mix often used in Indian cuisine.

To turn it into a curry, you really also need to fry some garlic, ginger, and chilli at the very least. Also, the yellow colour in western style curry powders is turmeric. Don't forget to add some salt too!


Tips on cooking for people with different allergies

A few basics which haven't been mentioned:

Find out what people's allergies are before they come (they should tell you, but better to ask)
Make labels which list food ingredients and put them on your buffet.
Bring an epi-pen.


baking a Souffle to make it as much liquidish as possible

I get your point.  A souffle is often just set, but sometimes, as in when making something like a chocolate lava cake, the cooking is completed early so that the inside remains liquid. I would not use the top element of your oven, as this simply over cook the surface.  I would just use the oven rack in the center, rather than placing the souffle on the bottom rack.  That has always worked fine for me.  This is a time sensitive product, and much depends on the size of the container you are baking in.  It is often best to bake these in single serving ramekins so that you have greater control over the timing. For a liquid center, keep a close eye on it.  Remove after it has risen and the top has set.


Why are all sour cream cultures I've found for sale online labeled as direct set? Why can't I reuse like I do yogurt?

If you can't find a reusable sour cream starter, you can use buttermilk starter.  Some bloggers and biology/chemistry professors just use fresh active buttermilk as a starter rather than ordering some online.  If you look at the various labels and product pages, you will find that both the buttermilk and sour cream starters contain the same four cultures: Lactococcus lactis subsp. lactis, Lactococcus lactis subsp. cremoris, Lactococcus lactis biovar diacetylactis and Leuconostoc mesenteroides subsp. cremoris.
In the Q & A for their buttermilk starter, culturesforhealth.com also provides this tip for using it for sour cream:

It is best to maintain it in regular whole milk, rather than reculturing cream long term.

On another page, Dr. Frankhauser goes on to say:

SOUR CREAM is produced by the same bacteria as buttermilk, but the starting milk product is pasteurized light cream. Bacteria are less numerous than in buttermilk.

This may be related to the lower concentrations of lactose found in unfermented milk products that contain higher percentages of fat. My best guess is that companies don't market the sour cream starters as heirloom or reusable because starting the new batch from the last batch may not reliably provide results that are as robust over time as their other products. If you just use milk for your starter, you can reuse it over time.


Bread recipe calls for dry milk powder. Can I use dry buttermilk powder?

You'll be fine doing a straight substitution.  Well, maybe I shouldn't be so definitive since these are powders we're talking about and it's not quite the same thing, but I've substituted buttermilk for whole milk in bread recipes plenty of times.  The only thing that changed for me was the rising time.  When I use buttermilk in my sandwich bread, it needs an extra 20 minutes or so on the first rise compared to the whole milk version.


First: the information that "marinades only penetrate 1/8 inch" appears to be entirely from the show America's Test Kitchen (ATK); I reviewed multiple articles on it on the internet, and all of them cited ATK or didn't cite any source.  I mention this because ATK has been wrong before due to flawed test conditions, so maybe some judicious testing of your own is in order.  Assuming that ATK is correct, though, here's answers to your questions:

With marination, only the salt will affect the meat more than 1/8 inch deep.  However, the other flavors will affect that top 1/8 inch, so if you're eating that portion you still care.  Also, some marinating techniques like lechon asado involve piercing the meat many times, which lets the marinade penetrate more of the meat by increasing the surface area.
For a dry brine, having ingredients other than salt would only interfere with the brining process if the other ingredients were on thickly enough to keep the salt from contacting the surface.  Since dry brining rarely involves a 100% salt coverage (although there are a few that do), this seems unlikely to be a real problem.
Sugar will actually have a similar effect on meat as salt does; both denature proteins and increase moisture retention.  Of course, sugar is rarely used to brine meat, but it is used for fish.  Serious tenderizers, like bromelain from pineapple, may also penetrate the meat -- certainly we believed it did for South Texas fajita recipes -- but I haven't ever seen an actual scientific test of this.


How to heat frozen stuffed pretzels other than bake them

In case you do not have specific instructions from the company making them or a special warmer (see comments), I would try microwaving them first (e.g. defrost) and then broiling/baking them.

Alternatively, I've seen fast food cooks blast frozen foods in the microwave at high for a little while before throwing them into the deep-fryer, maybe that could be an option as well.

Or, since you mentioned that space/power/time is of the essence, you might even be able to use a combined microwaving/broiling function in case your oven offers it.

Experiment a little and you should be able to get the settings right quite fast.

PS: I'm assuming that thawing a few products beforehand is undesired and therefore leaving out that possible option.


Substitute for eggs in Macarons (No Legumes)

I believe you can use sun-flower lecithin (make sure you don't get soy-lecithin) as the foaming agent, optionally together with xanthan gum some or some other thickener to get the desired thickness you want.

You'll need to beat the lecithin+water+sugar until it gets foamy. And then fold in the almond flour.


How do you shell groundnuts (peanuts) without breaking their kernels?

You can most generally shell peanuts with your hands. There are different methods you can do depending on how sturdy the shells are.

1- If the shells are sturdy, hold each side of the neck (if you know what I mean) with each hand, and then break it apart. Now you have two shells with peanuts in them but there is a hole in each shell. Take one of them and apply pressure to the side opposite from the hole by putting the shell between your thumb and index finger and pressing your thumb. The hole will get bigger and you get your peanut.

2- If the shells are not so sturdy (which most often is the case), do the last step in the previous method. Just apply pressure by putting the shell between your thumb and index finger and pressing your thumb a little hole will form, get bigger, and then you get your peanut.

3- If the shells are really thin, and your fingernails are long, you can just crack into them by pressing with your nails.


Garlic produces non-toxic allicin and allicin in the pickling process. When allicin and allicin are mixed together, the garlic becomes a hundred green.
The pickled garlic turns green not because the pickled garlic contains chlorophyll, which will produce green when exposed to sunlight like a plant, but because the garlic produces non-toxic allicin and allicin, allicin and garlic in the pickling Mixing the yellow pigments turns the garlic into green. After answering the questionnaire, the antioxidative ability of allicin is very strong. Therefore, eating green pickled garlic is not only non-toxic, but also has the effect of strengthening the body.


According to this video on Youtube, which is one of the few references I could find:

They are essentially fully cooked beans that have then been dehydrated for long term storage.  Therefore, they will "cook" again quickly as they are already cooked, and are essentially just being rehydrated.

If you listen to the video (it is mostly narration, and a few still pictures, and are very, very, very patient in listening), the narrator will describe how she creates them which comes down to:

Pre-soak the beans
Pressure cook them
Dehydrate them

Note that the first two steps are probably not that critical—you could cook the beans by whichever method you prefer.


what's a good technique for pasteurizing eggs?

The microwave is too harsh an environment for this.

If you have a sous vide circulator, you can also pasteurize in-shell at 135 F (57 C) for for 75 minutes according to Douglas Baldwin's A Practical Guide to Sous Vide Cooking.

To pasteurize on the stove in the shell takes some care. You must bring the water up to 140 - 150 F (60 - 65 C) for 3 to 5 minutes to pasteurize them. You must not exceed 150 or you will begin to cook the egg. If the eggs are in the water as you heat it then they will closely match the temperature of the surrounding water. Just make sure they aren't resting on the bottom of the pan. If you want to be extra careful you can leave them in longer, as long as you don't let them get too hot.

Alternatively, since you're using them in egg nog, you can combine the eggs with the milk and heat this slowly on the stove until it reaches a temperature or 140-150 F, maintaining for 3-5 minutes.


Butter flavored shortening and a touch of water (because butter has water in it too).  The key thing here is that you have a have a solid fat because you're beating air bubbles into the butter during the creaming process.  These bubbles are needed for the bread to properly rise during baking.

The browning process may be an issue though - shortening has no protein.  You're after an umami flavor from the Malliard reaction ...  it may be difficult to add that because of the lack of protein.  A pinch of MSG maybe, for the umami?


Please suggest a substitute for espresso powder which is not made from coffee

You can pretty much substitute coffee with roasted grain coffee-like powder of any brand you like. It works as a drop-in replacement in drinks and foods really well. After all, coffee is just a roasted grain, too.

If you need instant coffee, one that dissolve in water or baked goods, I know for a fact that Inka brand makes instant roasted grain "coffee" that can be used as substitute. I don't know about other brands quality, but you can try ones found on Amazon.

I personally prefer ones with sugar beet and chicory, some brands also use dandelion. Additions are there to emulate coffee better, to make taste more rich and complicated. Basically, if it tastes good and is bitterish enough, it'll work.

I'm not affiliated with linked sellers. It is just an example.


Are there reasons to use olive oil when roasting food at high temperatures?

Just because the oven is reaching high heat does not mean the olive oil that is on the surface of what is being cooked will reach the oven temperature (or get past the smoke point, even). In a deep fryer, heat is transferred almost directly from the heating element to the oil. In a pan, heat is transferred from the heat source to a pan, then directly to the oil. Both those represent very efficient heat transfers, and can bring an oil to past its smoke point. The oven transfers heat from source to food via the air, which is a very inefficient form of heat transfer. The temperature of the oil you apply to your food will be vastly more affected by the mass of the food than by the air in the oven environment.


Why does the pasta I make with my extruder always stick together?

Your dough is too wet.

Four eggs is a lot for 2 cups flour - the KPEXTA user guide suggests 4 eggs + 1 tbsp water for 3-1/2 cups flour. Assuming you're using the mixer to mix the dough, it should be crumbly and not form a ball, but it should hold together when you pick some up and squeeze it in your hand. If you have a kitchen scale handy a typical egg pasta ratio is one large egg (about 1/4 cup) per 100 grams flour.