Natural is purely a marketing term, and it is essentially meaningless since it isn't regulated by the USDA (I'm assuming you are in the USA, I can't speak for other countries). Since the term isn't regulated (with the apparent exception of meat), any manufacturer can put it on any (non-meat) product that they want, whether it is actually "natural" or not.

Organic is well-defined by the USDA and places a number of restrictions on the types of pesticides and other chemicals that can be used to grow the crop. For things like meat, the organic label regulates both the drugs that the animal is given as well as the production of the feed.

  Certified organic food products are
  regulated by the U.S. Department of
  Agriculture and produced by farmers
  and manufacturers under a strict set
  of rules. But the agency defines the
  term "natural" only for meat and
  poultry. In the rest of the food
  industry, the meaning is largely up to
  the producer.

See: http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2009-07-10/business/chi-natural-foods-10-jul10_1_organics-or-least-chip-popular-horizon-organic-brand-organic-industry-watchdog-group


Making "french fries" out of Cassava/Yuca root

This is how my mom prepares it (she's from Brazil, so it might be a tad different):

Cut off all the dark brown skin
Wash it and put it into a pot of water and bring to a boil
Boil for about 10 minutes (it should still be slightly firm, but not hard)
Cut it up into french-fry sized pieces
Put the slices in a single layer on a cookie sheet and place in the freezer for about an hour
Heat oil, fry them for about 10 minutes (until golden brown)
Sprinkle with salt

Steps 1-5 can be done ahead of time and you just pull out what you need from the freezer to fry. I have not personally made these, but I ate hers a lot and they were fantastic!


Pre-grated.

Don't use pre-grated cheese for any sauce where consistency matters. Pre-grated cheeses are almost universally coated with cellulose to prevent clumping. This will muck up a good sauce every time. If it's going into a lasagna or a mac & cheese though, chances are it will go unnoticed by any but the cook.


Why is lye used in some recipes for cookies?

First of all, lye is not "water boiled with ash".  You might be thinking of potash, which used to be used as lye, but virtually all food-grade lye today is sodium hydroxide.

In terms of its function, it largely raises the alkalinity (pH).  Baking soda does too, but sodium hydroxide is far more potent - let's just say you don't want to get any on your hands by accident.

The reason some recipes use lye is that alkalinity is a major promoter of the Maillard reaction, which is responsible for the crisping and browning you see in many baked goods - most notably pretzels.  I haven't seen cookie recipes using it but I imagine that those recipes would produce very crisp and hard cookies - not my cup of tea but maybe that's what you want.

The only ingredient I know of that you can use instead is baking soda, but I wouldn't call that a replacement, more like a substitution.  It will work the same way, but in the end you'll have something much softer and less browned.

There is actually another substance that is in between the pH of sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) and sodium hydroxide (lye), and that is sodium carbonate AKA "washing soda".  It's listed as a food additive (E500) but it is rather difficult to find in food-grade forms.  As its name implies, it's more commonly used as a detergent.  However, it would be a better substitute than baking soda due to its higher pH.

One can make food grade sodium carbonate (Na2CO3) from food grade baking soda, sodium bicarbonate (NaHCO3), by baking it an oven spread out on a cookie sheet at 350° F for one hour; baking longer won't hurt.  This drives off water and carbon dioxide to form food grade washing soda (sodium carbonate) which increases the pH more than baking soda.

Here's the reaction for the above process:

  2NaHCO3 ---> Na2CO3 + CO2 + H2O


I have seen two sorts: a polymer felt-type pad and a natural clay version sandwiched between synthetic fabric. Both are meant to regulate humidity. Soak up excess moisture and expire it back as needed.

Both claim to be anti-microbial in design.
The clay, I suspect, is near in structure to montmorillonite which is micro-crystalline; actually bursts bacteria! The synthetic would be engineered to discourage growth of mold such as some sport socks do.

Neither need to touch veggies directly to function. Potatoes, I would place directly as I peel them anyway. Bamboo washcloth can be dampened and used as a cover over delicate greens similarly -bamboo is naturally anti-microbial.


Sous-vide - What does circulation accomplish?

Since temperature control is so vital to sous vide cooking, the circulation serves to make sure that all of the water is moving and of an even temperature. If you just had a heating element submerged without a circulator, you would get some convection currents, but there would be hot and cold spots in your water bath. If these differences were even just a few degrees, you could end up with proteins not hitting their coagulation temperatures, connective tissues not softening, pectin not broken down, etc. All in all, it would defeat the purpose of this cooking method!

As for the differentiation between "circulators" and "water ovens", there may not be one. Frequently the actual thermal unit and pump is referred to as the "circulator" and the whole assembly with a vessel and water is referred to as the "oven", but I'd check the specs of each model to see whether it has all the parts you're looking for.


Brownies are thicker than a standard cake sponge, but either can absorb moisture, if you want to prevent that then a thin layer of chocolate frosting would work fine, or as you suggest a thin layer of chocolate.

It is opinion based whether I think a brownie or a sponge would be better with mousse, what I will say is that the consideration is the difference in consistency between the two. A rich, soft mousse on top of soft, fluffy cake may more people than hitting a thick, harder layer of brownie, but it all depends on the effect you are looking for.


You need to let the sausages sit exposed to some air -- refrigerated, of course -- for a few hours (preferably overnight) so that the twisted segments of casing dry out and become tough again. Lay them out on a baking sheet, uncovered, and flip them at some point to make sure the whole surface is drying. If you have space, you can hang them up so that all sides are getting air at once. (Aside: this is also an important step for smoked sausage. See "sausage pellicle".)

If you don't have time for that, you can tie off each twist with a bit of butcher's twine (although this is also time-consuming and rather mind-numbing). One loop, cinched tight around each twist, will keep them from untwisting in the water. If you're really pressed for time, stuff the casings a little tighter and don't link them at all. When these full-length sausages have cooled, you can simply slice them into your desired portions.

Also, if you're losing "a lot of juices", you are either overcooking the sausage or not emulsifying it properly. There should be very little juice exuded when you cut into a link. You need to keep the ground meat quite cold during every stage up until cooking. The sausage should become quite tacky after mixing -- enough that it actually sticks to a rubber spatula (although some variation is possible for stylistic reasons). Don't boil the links, either, when it comes to that stage. Poach them in (salted) water in the 180-190˚F range, and check them with a thermometer -- they don't need to go higher than 160˚F (former "safe pork cooking temp" recommended  by USDA). I shoot for 145-150˚.


Why do I have lumps in my caramel? (NOT crystallized sugar.)

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

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

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

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

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

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


How to get vegan cheese to taste like cheese

According to Eater, the latest and most sophisticated vegan cheeses involve fermentation of the cheese base itself, rather than by adding any particular ingredient:

The process for making fermented vegan cheese, which is most nut-based cheese, is quite similar to that used to make dairy cheese. A nut is soaked and then blended with water to create a milk base, to which a culture is added.

As such, if you're making your own, then you need to look into how to ferment your own nut milks and other ingredients.


How do I make a frappuccino less watery?

Aha, the article and comments on this site:
 http://www.squawkfox.com/2011/06/16/frappuccino-recipe/
suggest using double-strength coffee and (the secret ingredient) adding a pinch of xanthan gum. I might have to see if I can get that anywhere!


If it is like the pans I've used, the copper bottom is attached to the bottom of the stainless "bowl" - almost impossible to wear through unless you clean frequently with a sandblaster.

Leaching from a copper vessel might be dangerous if it were routinely cleaned violently back to bright metal, or used to cook strongly acidic foods. If copper vessels are used routinely for cooking, they form a passive layer on the surface, and do not present a huge problem as long as malachite (green) does not form in the cooking area.


When cooking or baking is it better to steam peppers or add them raw?

Jalapeno added to a muffin should be minced sufficiently finely that it is not necessary to par-cook it in any way, but you may choose to in order to develop flavor.

When adding larger peppers like a pablano, I like to roast (not steam) them first, to:

Remove the skins
Soften the flesh, as the larger dice may not completely cook during the baking process
Develop that delicious roasted flavor

Incidentally, I find a can of diced hot peppers performs extremely well in corn muffins, and is very friendly for last minute baking out of the pantry.

The heat in peppers is due to a chemical called capsacin, which is found mostly in the ribs and membranes surrounding the seeds.  You can influence the heat level in your muffin by how much of this part you include.

By cutting out the ribs, membranes, and seeds and using only the outer flesh of the pepper, you minimize the amount of heat; by including these parts, you maximize it.

Whether or how you par-cook the pepper before baking it in the muffin has no real influence.


Why do dumplings float when they are ready?

I will quote here the bible of cooking science, Harold McGees "On Food and Cooking":

  "Dumpling doughs are minimally kneaded to maximize tenderness, and benefit from the inclusion of tiny air pockets, which provide lightness. [...] This  tendency to rise with cooking is due to the expansion of the
  dough's air pockets, which fill with vaporized water as the dumpling
  interior approaches the boiling point and make the dough less dense
  than the surrounding water."

Following this, your dumpling must be a proper dumpling - dough that was only minimally kneaded, while altitude does not matter.

Why does this coincidence with being ready?

  [...] the starch granules absorb water molecules, and swell and soften as
  the water molecules intrude and separate the starch molecules from
  each other. This granule softening [...] takes place in a temperature
  range that depends on the seed and the starch, but is in the region of
  140-160°F/60-70°C. The tightly ordered clusters of amylose molecules
  require higher temperatures, more water, and more cooking time to be
  pulled and kept apart than do the looser clusters of amylopectin
  molecules.

So, altogether, the starch molecules do not absorb much more water as they are done, so the remaining water can vaporize and fill the air pockets, which makes the dumpling float then. Or, in other words, a floating dumpling is actually overcooked and so guaranteed to be ready (if the preconditions are met).

Does this rule ever fail?

Yes. Your dough needs to have sufficient air pockets for floating. Your dough needs to be made out of starch that is willing to absorb water. A dough made out of waxy potatoes has a fair chance to not float in time. This does match with German recipes for potato dumplings using waxy potatoes, that warn about the dumplings falling apart due to overcooking, if there is too much water in the pot (as it takes too much time for the dumpling to rise).


The two tools I have used to make my own pasta are rollers and extruders.

The extruder sounds similar to the pressurized tool you described above. It uses an auger like a meat grinder and produces round pasta like spaghetti. Shells and macaroni are also made by extruding. The material that the die is made from with affect the texture of the pasta surface. The one that I used was an attachment to a stand mixer and costs ~$100.

Pasta rollers have a couple precision rollers with variable spacing for forming the pasta and a set of cutters for slicing the pasta into linguine. There are various sized cutters- my cutters are just one size. The rollers are also a fairly simple machine and can be powered, a stand mixer attachment, or rolled by hand which I have. My hand cranked rollers cost ~$50 new.

Rollers are easy to get used because they are the kind of thing that people get for wedding gifts and never use- like yogurt makers. I got mine unused at a garage sale for $5. This bit of information may not be applicable to you in Germany. :)


Why did the crust get too hard on my Blueberry Cheesecake?

Your ratio of butter to cookie is probably the main problem here: using too much butter and refrigerating it overnight will give your crust the texture of... well... refrigerated butter.

So, change the recipe and use one of the following options:

Lightly soak the cookies in coffee/tea/lemonade/Cognac/whatever liquid is to your taste.
Use less volume of butter and add the same volume of cookies.
Powder the cookies in a blender
Use a mixture of oil and butter (take one with a neutral taste like grape-seed oil).  Test out a few spoonfuls in some shot glasses (50/50, 60/40, ... until you get the texture you want)

You can also combine the above, but that would be riskier: change one parameter at a time...

Can I have a piece of that perfect blueberry cheesecake now? :-)


I use the cylindrical jars from Weck and would say that the headroom can be kept the same in general. At the end of the day you just don't want any stuff to swell over and not have too little in there so it spoils.
In my experience keeping about a fingers worth of space to the rim will not cause you any major issues.


How much brine do I need to freeze icecream?

Brine

Some assorted thoughts, before I try to guess an actual quantity:

Dependence on overrun shouldn't really be significant, as long as you're mixing well. The air doesn't add significant heat capacity, but it will make heat transfer less effective by providing some insulation, so you do need to mix well.

I can't imagine dependence on type of ice cream being that huge - whether you're using cream or egg yolks, you've still got plenty of water. I found a table for specific heats; it looks like eggs have a slightly lower heat capacity above freezing, and slightly higher after. I'm not sure about just the yolks, or about the latent heats of either. In any case, the properties of the ice cream custard will be somewhere between water and those. (Wildly generalizing, ice cream might be 1/5 sugar and 1/6 fat by weight.)

The more salt you have in your brine, the colder you can get it before it freezes. You won't be able to get it as cold if you don't have as much salt. I think you were slightly misinformed in chat: 0F (-17.7C) was defined (for whatever reason) using ammonium chloride. Saltwater brine (sodium chloride) can reach -21.1C (-6.0F) with 23.3% salt by weight (source: wikipedia). I believe the freezing point is roughly linear as a function of salt concentration; in any case, it'll be the most effective with the highest concentration.

You missed one factor that may well be bigger than anything you listed: heat coming in from the environment. This will depend on how well insulated your outside vessel is, the ambient temperature, and how much surface of the brine is exposed. (Also on how much you're gripping it with your hands, I suppose.)

As for quantities, I could try to ballpark something using specific heat/latent heat, but I think a far better method is to just look at the recipes for "ice cream in a bag" - the general idea of those is to put the ice cream mixture in a smaller plastic bag bag, inside a gallon bag full of icy brine, and shake. There are a lot of recipes using a sandwich or quart bag with 1/2 to 1 cup volume (probably ~120-240g) ice cream mixture, inside a gallon bag with at least 2-3 cups of crushed ice plus plenty of salt (maybe 300-600g? hard to say). I also found this one with the brine just in a bowl, using a pint (probably ~475g) of ice cream mixture and 3-4 pounds of ice. The latter is a little easier to estimate based on; it suggests for 100g of ice cream mixture you might need 300-350g of brine. (The other recipes are consistent with this.)

Mixing

This is really a separate question from all the brine stuff. If you want to get good ice cream, you absolutely must mix (churn). This both helps minimize crystal size and incorporate air. (Unlike whipping a liquid, mixing during freezing doesn't have to be as vigorous to get the air in.) It's possible that if you freeze it fast enough, you could make up for the air part with your pre-whipping, but I suspect you'll lose a bit of that volume during freezing. So at the very least, stirring will break up crystals, and it may well give you airier, fluffier ice cream too. (I'd be careful with that New York Times recipe I linked to; it's going to be prone to giving you unwanted crystallization if you don't take care with the "kneading", and may not leave a lot of overrun.)

General advice

I know you may have reasons not to do this, but in general, if you're willing to go to this much effort, you might as well buy an ice cream machine if you can. The part that you freeze will probably take up less freezer space than the ice/brine you'd otherwise use, and it'll also do the churning for you.


Microwave Oven Rust -Does it affect FOOD cooked in it (hurt us?)

Rust wouldn't contaminate the food.

The concern would be that a rusted edge could keep the oven from sealing properly and thus leaking microwave radiation into the room. There isn't any way to detect leakage without special equipment.


Why can applesauce be used in place of oil?

Fundamentally, the reason for this substitution is that applesauce contains pectin.

In baking, the role of oil is to coat the flour, preventing it from combining with the water (or other wet ingredients) and developing gluten.  Gluten is what causes dough to rise, and also gives elasticity to the final product - what most people think of as "chewiness."

When you're baking, for example, a cake, or even a pie crust, you want to limit the amount of gluten that develops.  A cake or pie crust should be moist, light, and fluffy, not tough and chewy.  When you bite into a cake and find it very dry and bread-like, that is because it has developed a lot of gluten.  A good amount of oil or other fat leads to a lighter, moister, less-glutinous result.

The pectin in applesauce can also, to a certain extent, help to inhibit gluten formation in a dough, but the similarities end there.  I cannot stress this point enough, and I've seen many other online resources get this dead wrong: Pectin (applesauce) is not a straightforward or foolproof substitute for fat.

The mechanisms by which pectin and oil work in this context are completely different:

Oil is a lipid.  Lipids bind to starch (including the ~75% starch in flour) and are hydrophobic - the traditional example of this is dew drops forming on the surface of grass or plants (the latter being the hydrophobe).  In a sense, oil forms a protective "shield" around the flour molecules.
Pectin, on the other hand, is a gelling agent, and specifically a polysaccharide.  Pectin is not hydrophobic and does not actually protect the flour molecules.  In fact, pectin is of the same family as starches, which are also polysaccharides.  What's really happening here is that the pectin competes with the flour for water.  That means less water overall reaches the starch and gluten-forming proteins (giladin and glutenin) in the flour, and because of this, it is not able to develop as much gluten or gelatinize much of the other starch.

What does all of this actually mean for you, the baker?  Quite simply, it means you have to be very careful with this substitution:

Too much pectin can turn your recipe into a jelly-like consistency.
Too little pectin will fail to prevent glutenization (in other words, you'll get bread).
Pectin has the property of syneresis - meaning that once it starts to gel, it also starts to expel liquid, and your dessert will dry out or deflate over time.
Pectin is actually water-soluble at high temperatures (technically, it forms a colloid), it just happens to absorb a lot of water along the way.  Baking for too long, or at too high a temperature, will cause the pectin to break down and dissolve completely, making it useless.

There are also several other problems (or at least "gotchas") when making the apple sauce substitution:

Applesauce is not just pectin.  It has a good deal of water and various proteins and acids, and even a certain amount of lipids.  The exact quantities, however, depend on how the applesauce was made, so it is very hard to get precise control over the amount of pectin, and the textbook 1:1 substitution ratio is almost never correct.
Another thing that applesauce contains is sugar - even unsweetened applesauce.  You will almost certainly need to reduce the amount of sugar elsewhere in your recipe.  This may be difficult, especially if the bulk of the sugar is used as a dry ingredient.
Applesauce behaves somewhat similarly to oil, but do not even try using it as a substitute for any other fat.  Butter, in particular, contains milk proteins which act as natural emulsifiers; pectin does have certain stabilizing properties but is a rather poor emulsifier compared to butter[citation needed].  And it goes without saying that the flavour is substantially different from that of applesauce; oil is "OK" to substitute for because it has very little flavour of its own.

If you plan on using applesauce as a substitute for oil in a recipe that does not specifically explain how to use it as a substitute, then I strongly suggest you do two things:

Don't substitute the entire quantity.  Use 1/2 oil, 1/2 applesauce, or maybe 1/4 oil and 3/4 applesauce.  You will likely also have to lower the total quantity of oil/applesauce to approximately half of what it originally was (give or take 1/4).
If you can, try this substitution on a small scale first, and experiment with the quantities of oil, sugar, and applesauce, before going all-out and putting it into the oven while your guests arrive.  It's very likely that on the first few attempts, you'll end up with something that's palatable, but nowhere near the quality of the oil-based recipe.

Ignore these disclaimers at your own risk!


Does anybody know what company made this spatula?

I think the answer is right there. It is an INOX spatula.
This one has the same ridges on the handle.

http://www.100x100chef.com/index.php/eng/shop/collection-retail/inox-retail2/retail-plating-spatula-detail.html


Ground meat is safe for 1 - 2 days in the fridge. Ground meat is prone to spoil fast due to the larger surface per unit of measure compared to non-ground meat.


I am unable to eat tomatoes. What can I use instead, especially in soups?

There is an alternate product available that does not contain tomatoes. It is called  Nomato .
It is described on the home page as:

Nomato sauces are a delicious natural alternative to traditional tomato based products.

Additional info:

Nomato may be substituted in any recipe using tomato sauce, barbecue sauce, ketchup or salsa.
Nomato is made from vegetables and seasonings. It contains no soy, dairy, wheat, gluten, nuts and of course no tomatoes!

I am not promoting this product and, quite frankly, have not tried it. However, I did read several great reviews about it.


Why isn't my American-style baked cheesecake very sweet or rising significantly?

New-York style cheesecake shouldn't have much rise to it.  The mixture is basically a custard and the only rise would come from steam created in bubbles that are incorporated during the beating process.

While a REALLY smooth texture is the goal, you don't want to aerate the batter as in other cakes or you'll end up with cracking on the surface from the expansion of the air bubbles.  Pull the cream cheese out a couple hours in advance to ensure that it is at room temperature throughout.  Eggs must also be at room temperature and can easily be warmed by putting the whole egg in a bowl of hot water from the tap for 5-10 minutes.  Having these ingredients at room temperature will create a really smooth texture without beating in too much air.

In regard to sweetness, you might be able to increase the sugar slightly (compare the ratio of sugar to cream cheese in your recipe vs. others), but be careful not to add too much.  Excessive sugar will make the custard too watery from the formation of sugar syrup and will make it difficult for it to set up.


You can use definitely use polenta/cornmeal for breading, but it'll tend to be noticeably more crunchy than breadcrumbs are.

An obvious comparison is cornmeal fried fish. People make it multiple ways: some just dredge in cornmeal so it'll add a definite crunch, while others use a batter which will soften it up. The moisture from whatever you've coated matters too. I'm guessing pork loin isn't going to release a whole lot of water, but if you're marinating it perhaps you'd get some from there.

Since polenta is coarser, I'm guessing you might want to err on the side of caution, to avoid crunchy turning into gritty.


How does removing the germ of garlic help with breath/digestion?

According to this blog it makes a difference when the garlic isn't cooked (but less so if it is cooked)
http://www.davidlebovitz.com/should-you-remove-the-green-germ-from-garlic/


you can keep the coconut milk for 3 more days and that's the maximum after this time you find that it begins to coagulate and that smells fowl. i bought coconut milk for a prawn recipe for valentines day http://www.mariellasmenu.com.ng/2016/02/tiger-prawns-in-coconut-milk-valentines.html and i had some left over, , even though it was in the freezer, it had gone bad


Handles on pots loosen over time - can I loctite them?

You could use Loctite 2046 which is food safe. They list deep fryers as a possible application, so it should also work on a cooking pot.


Does adding oil to pasta water reduce the tendency to boil over?

Not significantly. The idea behind the technique is to reduce surface tension, thus reducing bubbling.  Oil isn't very good at doing this.  Oil is, however, very good at coating your pasta, which can reduce the ability of the pasta to absorb the sauce.  Better idea:  Use a bigger pot and more than enough water to let the pasta move about freely.


When should food colouring be added to part of a batch of bread dough?

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

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

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

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


How to keep battered (tempura) goods from sticking to the deep frying pan?

What you are describing should not happen when using the right technique. I suspect this is happening because you are either lowering the battered food into the oil using the net, or your oil temperature is not hot enough to cook the batter before the food sinks to the bottom. The net is only for removing the food once it is cooked.

Battered food should be partially lowered gently into the oil by hand and then dropped the rest of the way once partially submerged, if you lower using the net the batter will get in the net and it will all cook together.

Temperature-wise your oil should be about 175C (350F), if it's much lower than that the batter won't crust up fast enough.

Also avoid crowding your fryer, if you put too much in at once your oil temperature will drop too much and it may end up forcing pieces in to the net too quickly.


Attempt to make praline paste failed -- what should I do differently?

Upon reading those instructions, I can picture vividly the scenario you describe. It seems like the caramelized sugar would of course solidify and cleave to the bottom of the (relatively cold) food processor as you pour it in. Or is the friction of the food processor supposed to keep the caramel melted at its original temperature as it whirls around while the nuts pulverize? That even sounds kind of unsafe somehow.

Curious, I looked up other recipes for praline paste on the internet - and there are lots. These are the first 4 I came across:

http://joepastry.com/2011/making-praline-paste/

http://www.thedomesticfront.com/pralinepaste/

https://beammeupbiscotti.wordpress.com/2012/04/14/useful-tips-how-to-make-praline-paste/

http://www.chefrachida.com/homemade-hazelnut-praline-paste/

All of these specify letting the caramel and nut mixture harden and cool on a non-stick surface first, and then you break it up into pieces and put into the food processor. The first reference shows pictures of the progression of the product from chunks to powder to paste as the food processor works.

Even though it is contrary to the recipe, perhaps it would work better if you cooled the mixture before processing. I wonder if some sentence or phrase about the pre-processor cooling step got accidentally left out of your recipe.


Can you inject carbon dioxide/nitrogen into a dough/batter to provide leavening? Or use dry ice/liquid nitrogen?

It is not uncommon to use an ISI whipper for this purpose.  For example, tempura batter can be placed in a whipper, and it can be charged with CO2.  I'm not sure if that is more advantageous than simply mixing rice flour with seltzer water, but it is done.  Liquid nitrogen would freeze your batter, as would dry ice.  Dry ice would leave your batter somewhat carbonated upon thawing.  Your approach likely depends on what you are trying to accomplish.  I don't think this would be an effective approach dough, and for baking.  It might make sense for some batters.


Your clarification means a lot -- "baked" potato in the U.S. tends to be a whole potato cooked on its own, where the insides become fluffy and creamy, and is done with larger starchy white potatoes, or sweet potatoes work well, too.

Roasted potatoes, on the other hand, tends to be (in the U.S.)  be smaller "new" potatoes, waxy potatoes, or even larger starchy potatoes cut up (eg, 'oven fries').

The starchy potatoes only really hold up well when roasting if it's very high heat or a short amount of time -- if you're going to be cooking them with the roast as there's going to be moisture in there, I'd go for a waxy potato (eg, Red Bliss).

As for the browning -- probably coat them well with oil, and if they're not brown enough for your liking when you pull the roast, as you're going to have to rest it anyway, drain the meat juices, crank the oven up to somewhere around 450F (230C) and leave the potatoes in for a few extra minutes.

ps.  yes, I know a sweet potato isn't a potato.  And I also tend to use Yukon Gold for just about everything, as it makes great baked potatoes, and roasted potatoes (although, not sure how well with a roast at the same time) and they're good in pot roast and stews if you don't add them too early.


Can I cream butter, sugar and eggs ahead of time

You can cream them first, but it will be better to let them sit in the bowl while you go fetch the extract. If the store is far and your round trip time will be greater than an hour, I would put the ingredients in the refrigerator. Otherwise, I would leave them on the counter (cover if your kitchen is dusty or prone to small objects falling into bowls or insects) and cream them once you return. If you refrigerate the ingredients you'll have to bring them back up to room temperature if you want to cream them perfectly (however for most home cooking and baking cold temperature creaming works just fine as well - just not the best results).


Staleness in baked goods is caused by starch retrogradation. Basically as your baked goods age, the structure of the starches goes from fluffy to a more crystalline form, and this forces some of the water out of them. Unfortunately, once this has happened, there's really no way to get the water back in, as the stale flavor and feeling are more related to the starches crystallizing than to the loss of water.

Sometimes warming the starches will temporarily soften them again, but this will be temporary, and when they cool they'll be even more stale than before. You could try gently warming one cookie to see if it helps, and then warming the rest right before serving. If the cookies are already decorated, it may complicate this enough that it would be easier to just make a new batch.

As a last ditch, you could try adding a bit of simple syrup to the undersides of the cookies and letting it soak in. They won't taste "fresh" again, but it will make them less dry.


How do you substitute brown rice for white rice in recipes?

Mostly, it will take longer to cook your recipe with brown rice. You will also need to add a bit more water. That's OK, you can do that. Figure about 1/4 extra water (1/4 again above what you had already planned for white rice) and about 1/2 again as much time.

Consider your other ingredients - don't mush them all to hell to cook your rice.

So, figure 1/4 more water and 1/2 more time, add your other ingredients at the time you would otherwise - counting backwards.

In other words, add your other ingredients at that time in which you think the brown rice should be done simultaneously with your other ingredients.


Try burning it off. Put it in a 500 degree oven for an hour or so. If there is oil on it, it will smoke.

After that, you may need to re-season the Dutch oven.

Good luck.


It should work, since both are made in a similar manner, rinsed and simmered. If you're using whole grain farro, it does need soaking and longer cooking. I dry-toast the grain in a hot pan before adding the liquid, but that's not required.


My milk chocolate is grainy - how to fix it?

Sylvia-

Hi! The graininess may be caused by either ingredients or method. When making chocolate, I choose to use cocoa butter as opposed to other fats. It marries with the cocoa powder in a way that other ones seem to have problems with. Furthermore, I choose to combine the cocoa butter and cocoa powder with a violent whisk prior to the addition of heat, to ensure that it is mixed very well before cooking together. Once the consistency is correct through cooking over the boiling water, I remove from the heat and add the sweeteners and milk, also adding salt to taste. Removing from heat isn’t necessarily required, but I find that it is less likely to roast on me.

Another note is that it would do well to give your course ingredients a whirl in a grinder or food processor. I use granulated sugar, or other times, unprocessed sugar. Both of these course ingredients get a good amount of time with blades to create a finer product. Seeing as you are using powdered sugar, this shouldn’t be a problem - unless it becomes lumpy.


That looks like mould (mold). Kimchi typically only goes mouldy when the vegetables are not submerged, which looks like is happening here, probably because of your choice of container. Use a deeper container like a jar so that all the solids are submerged in the liquid, and continually pack them down so they do not dry out. Alternatively, use a pickling weight or even just a clean pebble. The mould here looks extensive enough to have contaminated the whole container, so you should not eat any of it and throw it away, unfortunately.


When's the best time to buy a Thanksgiving turkey?

It all depends what you want:

Best quality: Fresh, organic, heritage turkey. Order now, pick up maximum 1 week beforehand
Good quality, reasonable price: Frozen organic turkey. Buy now
Good quality, normal price: Fresh turkey. Order now, pick up maximum 1 week beforehand
OK price: Frozen turkey. Buy now
Best price: Buy a large chicken and tell everyone it's a small turkey!  :-)

When buying fresh, store in the coolest part of the fridge.


You might try melting it into some water.

When melting chocolate, a little bit of water will cause it to seize (break and become grainy), but if you use more water to start with it will melt smoothly - about a tablespoon per six ounces should work to start, add more till you've reached your desired consistency.  It has to do with the chocolate being soluble in either fat or in water, but having trouble in the middle when they were competing for sugar and cocoa solids.  If you do this, you are basically making a chocolate sauce - even if the proportions mean it is a fairly thick one.  Of course, after you have made it you can doctor it to your tastes, thin it till it is dippable, add flavors or additives, as you prefer.

Alternatively, you might melt it into something richer for your sauce - milk, or cream, or butter.

These alternatives will make your chocolate sauce progressively richer, depending on which one you pick, and may alter the flavors more than plain water (which may or may not be desirable to you).  They do also have water in them (in decreasing proportion), but in an emulsion with fats which means they are less likely to cause the chocolate to seize.  You might start with the same proportions, one tablespoon to six ounces, and keep adding until it has reached your desired consistency.

Of course, you can use other liquids (like alcohol) or fats (like oils) to thin the chocolate and make the sauce, but they will be increasingly less like the chocolate you started with the more flavors you add, and more like a fancy chocolate sauce.  Which can be nice, but may not be what you're asking for.


Will a lid with a hole in it work with a crock pot?

I have used a rice cooker lid as a replacement on an old crock pot. It has a small venting hole as you described.

I have been using this lid for years now and have yet to have a dish dry out. The hole is just too small to let much water out.


Does white chocolate HAVE to have milk in it?

White chocolate by regulation is at least 3.5% milk fat and 14% milk solids. As far as I know, the EU uses the same definition as the FDA (US).

So, nothing vegan can legally be sold as "white chocolate".

That said, there are a great many non-dairy white chocolate substitutes, usually made with any combination of soy milk, maltodextrin, vanilla, and saturated/hydrogenated fat (palm oil, shortening, etc.), among other ingredients/additives of course.

They don't taste the same as real white chocolate, but then again, white chocolate isn't real chocolate to begin with, so it can't hurt to experiment with some of the products out there - which can be easily sourced with a Google search, as one of the comments indicates.


What is in a Jamaican Chocolate Cheesecake?

While I've never experienced this cheesecake personally and the photo doesn't show anything at all "Jamaican" about it, I'd hazard a guess that the recipe involves rum.  The traditional go-to cake in Jamaica is a black fruit cake.  It involves soaking dried fruit in rum for an extended period of time and making liberal use of molasses for color.

If I were making it myself, I'd soak some dried fruit such as dates in rum for a few days.  Then I'd add rum to the cheesecake recipe and I'd chop the dates fine to put on top along with the shaved chocolate.


Either is fine, so long as you account for the liquid.

I normally add dry sugar or (rarely) salt at an early enough stage that the "proto-dough" is effectively still liquid and they will quickly dissolve, so it makes little difference. If adding at a later stage, a solution might be preferable for even distribution. Bring on the uptight bakers claiming you can't add stuff later (guess what, it still comes out bread...) And, of course, when using honey, molasses, or syrup, it's a solution whenever you add it.


How do you know moldy cheese is not spoiled?

Given the salt level, and level of "good" mold, not much can go wrong, and there is a very low risk of anything dangerous happening. It's probably going to dry out before it spoils.  Any storage that might happen is probably due to improper storage.  This is one case where smell and visual tests can help you determine spoilage. If you smell the aroma of ammonia, you probably have a problem.  If you see fuzzy mold, or mold that is off color, that is a good sign that there is some spoilage.  Any slimy cheeses should also be discarded.  Finally, if there are no obvious signs (or you see subtle signs) you can go ahead and taste it.  This is not normally something I would recommend, but again, with blue cheeses, there is a very low chance that something harmful is growing.  If it tastes off, that's not a good sign.


No Butter Sous Vide: What did they mean by this?

The (alleged) problem with extra fat during SV is that, flavor molecules will dissolve in fat and subsequently be discarded.
The claim is that, this causes the loss of flavor.

For searing it’s fine to use butter or other fat.


"Stainless" steel is an exaggeration at best. It will stain. Chances are you have some level of mineralization in your water (hard water), and that's what's causing the discoloration.

If it really bothers you you can use Bar Keepers friend or something similar to polish it, but it's unlikely that anything that doesn't come off with normal washing will come off in your food.


How does the metal of a baking sheet get burned?

A natural gas flame is about 1950 C or 3540 F, so yes, a lot hotter than 500 degrees. (source)
Electric stoves will get red hot, indicating a temperature in the range of about 500-900 C or 770-1220 F. (source)


It depends on the type of cake.  Pound cakes, and fatty, rich cakes like carrot cake are going to have the longest shelf life.  Some of them even improve in flavor over a day or two, and should last at least 3 and maybe up to 4 or 5 days.  Even some of the shorter lifespan cakes, like genoise, should be good for at least 24 hours.  Much depends on what you are layering or assembling the cake with, as well as what the layers are made of.

For example, if you have a pastry cream or whipped cream layer, these really only last a few hours.

Cakes also freeze exceedingly well, especially prior to being iced.

What you may choose to do is bake your layers or base cake at your convenience, let them cool, then wrap them well, and freeze.

Then, as reasonably close to service as is convenient, thaw the layers and ice, and optionally decorate as appropriate.

You can also freeze iced cakes, although it is a little trickier.

See also:

Where should I store my cakes?
(my answer describes how to freeze iced cakes)
How to properly freeze cake (really only talks about cakes that are not iced)
How do I properly freeze a frosted cake?


Why do salt flakes start building up in a bottle of mineral water after it was first opened?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solubility

Salt solubility decreases with decreasing pressure.


Kitchen towel vs dough seal in a dum biryani

I have used both methods. I don't really know why but the one cooked with dough tasted bit better than kitchen towel method for me.

I believe it was because the container was sealed very well and no room for air to escape. The meat is cooked to perfection too.

You are right the towel absorbs moisture which may even dry out the rice and meat so moisture is important for slow cooking.


For something like a drink, I generally bruise the mint and use the whole leaves fresh - rub it between your fingers a bit to release the oils and then just drop it in the drink.  The main benefit of this method for me is that a bunch of dry, crumbled mint in a drink is going to make it look very muddled and hard to drink, as you're constantly getting a mouthful of dried leaves (you could get around this by steeping it with the dried herbs and then straining it, but that's too much work!).  As a bonus, fresh picked herbs in a nice glass of lemonade, for example, just looks so fresh and tasty!

If I'm cooking with it and I have a supply of fresh on hand, I prefer to use that.  Depending on the dish, it might be whole leaves, but more likely chopped - I actually use kitchen scissors for a lot of fresh herb preparation as it can be easier than a knife in many cases.

You certainly can dry it, especially at the end of season when you need to harvest, and use the dried leaves in place of fresh.  The main benefit to drying is that it stores really well; dry also seems to be a bit more powerful, at least when first dried.  Over time the flavor of dried herbs will degrade.  You usually use a 3 to 1 ratio replacement - if a dish calls for 1 tablespoon of fresh mint, you'd use 1 teaspoon of dried, though as the dried herbs age you'll have to increase the amount used over time.


You can cut the apple cider with some apple cider vinegar. Adding a couple tablespoons of cider vinegar to 1 cup of apple cider should do the trick.

You can also add a bit of mustard seed, whole or ground to give it some heat that can help combat the sweetness. I wouldn't add more than a pinch of ground mustard or a half tsp of whole seeds.

I use this exact glaze on pork roasts all the time, but I've never tried it on chicken. Let me know how it is.


Soaking pulses overnight: safety vs refrigeration

I eat a lot of beans. I typically boil them for a minute and just let them sit on the stove. That way they soak more evenly and don't sprout.
Ideal breeding conditions. I've noticed that in rare cases, when it is really hot (25 C), they start to ferment a bit after half a day or so and the water gets foamy. From my empirical evidence this happens about 1 out of 30 times and I just change the water and boil them again.

One point to keep in mind is that sprouts are a very common vector for food borne pathogens and have caused many deaths.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10511518
These cases were always caused by external contamination, and not by the product itself going bad.
Either the seeds got contaminated by nearby agriculture, or the water used in the sprouting process wasn't clean.

So you should not be concerned by your pulses going bad, they would sprout or ferment, but by bacteria from the nearby CAFO sticking to them. One more reason to boil them first.


Can you use mascarpone in place of ricotta?

Welcome! You absolutely can substitute mascarpone for ricotta. I do it all the time with lasagna, pizza, etc. as many people don't like the texture of ricotta. I do add a pinch of salt to the mascarpone.


How do you get a feel for the heat (direct heat)?

There are a few factors that make it pretty easy to gauge heat:

Splash a few drops of cold water in a dry pan on an element.  If it bounces on the surface with a great fuss of noise, it's hot (medium-high).  Oil in a pan like this will smoke quickly, and is perfect for browning as adding ingredients will quickly drop the heat. Do not leave your hardware at this heat for long without adding anything to the pan.
Place your hand 3-4 inches over your grill or pan. If a few seconds become uncomfortable, it's above 400/450. If you can stand more seconds, it's 350ish.  And if it's comfortable it's probably not warm enough. I don't start grilling until my grill is closer to 600F (very obvious in a second or two).
If you have oil in a pan, look at the texture of the oil. If it's thick, it's still cool. You'll see it start to thin out and spread around (the oil will look very active); this is oil quickly warming.  As soon as the oil is at it's thinest it's hot.  When it starts to smoke, it's at the upper edge of it's heat range (add food quickly, or remove from heat). The texture of oil is quite neat to watch as it heats.
If you're deep frying, you'll see the texture change from #3.  As well, you can drop a tiny drop of water in the oil.  If it makes a fuss and starts to spit, the oil is above 350. The more fuss, the closer it 375 it is. Note that using too much water is dangerous, so you can alternatively try a small portion of the food you're frying. No bubbles means it's too cold.


Gluten-free replacement for all-purpose flour in fried fish batter?

In general, if something is burning too quickly, you need to turn down the heat, and cook it for longer.
As for recommendations for gluten free batters, there are plenty of gluten free tempura batter recipes out there that use rice flour.  Although it's worth noting that tempura is usually only cooked to 'golden' in color, not fully 'brown'.
And if you're willing to go with a three part breading instead of a batter, you can use rice flour, egg, and (rice or corn) cereal crumbs.


Can over whipped egg whites be used in other ways?

It should be easily usable in applications where the egg texture is not that important. Find a recipe which needs both eggs (not whipped) and a liquid, and add the liquid to the overwhipped egg until the foam has subsided. Add the yolks back in (such recipes generally call for whole eggs).

This should work with different types of griddle cakes: pancakes, waffles, crepes. Also with the liquid used to top moussaka etc., or the liquid used to create straciatella soups.


How to organize Goose and Duck for a Dinner?

At my household, we used to roast duck whole, and it took many hours. Nowadays, we split our duck in half before placing it in the oven, which obviously takes less time to cook.
You can use 135C on your oven to roast the goose legs, alongside the duck legs each sliced into a certain number of pieces, depending on how long it's going to roast in the oven.


Coconut milk looks like water with butter chunks

There can easily be some confusion regarding the terms cream of coconut, coconut milk, coconut cream, coconut water etc. It is normal and even often desirable for coconut milk to separate, and for the fattier part (the cream) to clump. Since that is generally not a great quality for mixed drinks, read on.

For Pina Coladas, the most commonly used product is Cream of Coconut, the sweetened, emulsified variety. Two common brands in the US are Coco Lopez and Goya. Coconut milk and coconut cream are totally different products from each other and from cream of coconut, so read the label carefully. When in doubt, check the ingredients. The product you want will have added sugar and emulsifiers.

Goya Cream of Coconut ingredients:

  Ingredients: Coconut Juice, sugar, polysorbate 60, salt, citric acid, mono and diglycerides, propylene glycol alginate, sorbitan monostearate, guar gum and locust bean gum.

Coco Lopez Cream of Coconut ingredients:

  Coconut, Sugar, Water, Polysorbate 60, Sorbitan Monostearate, Salt, Propylene Glycol, Alginate, Mono and Diglycerides (Emulsifiers), Citric Acid, Guar Gum, Locust Bean Gum.

These products will not clump like what you have experienced.

In grocery stores in the US, cream of coconut will be with other bartending mixers like margarita mix, not anywhere near the coconut milk. If you have any problem finding it, ask at a liquor store.


What are the optimal simmering times for each stage of a traditional phở?

This is not the answer you are directly looking for, but may be the trick

Some local Phở brewers soak the onion skins in alcohol (rice cooking wine) to extract a stock flavouring (I suspect this is Quercetin?). The resulting dark liquor is added to the broth when the meat is added

This certainly kicks up the broth flavour, a bit like MSG does in Chinese cooking (sort of)

Worth a try...

I don't think there is a magic order or timing to making Phở, as long as the flavours are extracted, and not destroyed, it comes out OK


How can you make a lot of water come out of chicken by freezing and denaturing it?

A freezer is a very dry place and uncovered meat will eventually have all of its moisture pulled out of it. This is called freezer burn.

First of all- don't try the freeze-thaw-freeze-thaw idea. This would be a good way to start your own colony of interesting, meat-eating bacteria.

There are two techniques to minimizing freezer damage- freeze the food quickly to keep ice crystals small and seal it tightly to keep it from drying out. You should do the opposite.

Put your meat in a freezer bag and inflate it with air before sealing it. Then wrap the bag in a towel or other insulative cover. Freeze for a while. The chicken will freeze relatively slowly which will rip its cells up nicely. All the air in the bag will ensure that moisture is drawn out of the meat over the course of many days.

This will, of course, leave you with tough, inedibly dessicated bird meat and flavorless water. It's probably a delicacy in some culture somewhere.

You could experiment with the brine but I wouldn't. The salt in a brine will help keep meat proteins from over-coagulating when heated- it wouldn't have the same effect when the proteins are frozen and dried. At worst it would prevent water loss- at best it would just dry back out of the meat and you could have just frozen the brine without wasting the chicken.


A stone is the hardest way to sharpen a knife. If you don't get the angle exactly right, you'll just be messing up your knife, not sharpening it. If you do want to go that way, yes, you'd definitely want to practice on something cheaper, because it's likely you will mess it up. This is why a lot of people just take their expensive knives to a professional to get sharpened. I've seen good knives sharpened into oblivion before - totally reshaped blades, and still not even really sharp.

Most electric sharpeners are designed to avoid all this - the good ones have a fixed angle sharpening surface, and something to hold the knife in the right orientation, so you can't mess it up. The one caveat is that Western style knives have 20° edges, while Japanese style ones have 15° edges, so for example in the US, the sharpeners you buy won't be good for Japanese style knives.

Additionally, you don't actually need to sharpen them very often at all. Periodically honing your knife will keep it pretty darn sharp, especially if it's a decent knife and you take good care of it otherwise. Give that a try, and you may not feel you need to sharpen it for a long while. At that point, since you won't be sharpening it all that many times in your life, it may not be worth learning to sharpen the hard way - a professional or an electric sharpener will be a lot easier.

But if you do want to get a stone and teach yourself, the thing to do is probably to start with a finer-grained one, so you can't destroy the knife as easily. You can practice getting the angle exactly right, doing finer sharpening. Hopefully that's all you'll need, but if you ever need to do more, once you've got some practice, you can move on to a coarser stone for really reshaping the blade. (Or... you can apparently save money and use sandpaper.)


Is it safe to use a propane torch bought at a Hardware store?

Propane and butane are pure alkanes. They don't produce anything nasty when burned. The worst you could possibly get should be carbon monoxide (and I am not even sure it can be produced in a torch, the dioxide ifs much more likely), but it being a gas, it won't stick to your food. The complex molecules you get from heating the food itself have more potential for being harmful than the combustion products of a propane butane torch. Ago yes, it is food safe.

Another matter of safety is that it is easier to cause a fire with a hardware store torch, because it has more power than the kitchen ones. But a sensible adult should be able to handle the thing safely.


I just made ice cream. Unfortunately, it became gritty in the end result. What is a way to make use out of it?

Given all of the advice so far, and as you said that you started with a rather large batch, I might try a few things.  I would recommend trying a small-ish portion at a time, so you don't ruin the whole batch:

Soften the ice cream slightly, then put it through a food processor to see if you can make it less gritty, then re-freeze.  (or possibly don't re-freeze, if it has a soft-serve like consistency)

Soften the ice cream slightly, then mix in other ingredients to add texture to the ice cream to try to hide the grittiness.  Nuts, cookie or pretzel bits, or anything else that's crunchy.  You could also make an 'ice cream pie', but you'd want a rather thin layer of ice cream so it's not so obvious that it's not cream.  (maybe something like this

Scrape it with a fork, and tell people it's a granita.  (or, actually make a fruit granita, and then serve it layered with granita / scraped ice cream / etc.)

Melt it down, add starch and cook into a pudding, then re-freeze. (frozen pudding also has a strange texture that isn't quite ice-cream like).

Melt it, add some more eggs, then use it as the custard for french toast or bread pudding.


Can "Canning" be achieved with "vacuum sealed" bags?

(disclaimer: I've only heard of people doing this, not done it myself.)

Yes, it can be done. You're looking for retort pouch canning. Various places will sell you the bags, and you can vacuum seal them with a chamber vac, though you may need an upgraded heat bar. Then you can process them in a pressure canner (or preferably autoclave).

I'd definitely follow the normal reheating recommendations (the boil it 10 minutes bit) before eating. I don't think USDA has home canning guides for retort pouches.


Is it normal for my pan to start smoking?

Different oils have different smoke points. If your oil is smoking it's simply too hot.

I'm assuming you're using fresh oil. Oil that has broken down because it's been reused (after frying, e.g.) or because it's older and has not been stored properly may have a lower smoke point and will most likely be rancid. Always store your oil away from heat, light, and air.

The smoke point of an oil won't change based on the pan, but some pans conduct differently from others, so it's possible that a cast iron pan, for example, may cause oil to smoke faster than a carbon steel pan does, simply because the cast iron pan is getting hotter where your flame or burner is (cast iron does not conduct heat evenly).

Depending on what you're cooking you generally want to heat your pan first then put in the oil when the pan is at the right temperature and then put the food in. If you're cooking with cast iron it's best to heat up your pan on low or medium for a while (several minutes) to let it heat evenly and then put in the oil then the food. If you're searing steak you want the pan ripping hot. One good trick with cast iron is to heat it in the oven then transfer it to the stove top for your searing.

If you provide more information about what oil you're using, what kind of pan, what kind of heat source, and what you're cooking, people here I'm sure will provide additional helpful answers for you.


are there any appliances that can automate feeding of sourdough starter?

I have not heard of any machine of that nature, and I try to keep up with an assortment of home beer brewing sources.  If anyone would have come up with something, it would probably be brewers, since we tend to use large amounts of live yeast.    About the most advanced thing I have heard of is storing wort in Nalgene bottles after boiling and using that for a starter.   I can't think of an analog for sourdough that would be safe and keep the starter maintained with a good flavor.   Pro brewers or bakers may have a tool that I'm unaware of, though.

I'm sure you could come up with some sort of Rube Goldberg machine to feed your starter, but really, it's like taking care of any living thing.   You have to water and feed plants, animals, and yeast cultures.   It's a small amount of work, too, really.   Add water, flour, maybe some sugar, and stir.   You might want to stick with non-sourdough breads if you can't make that kind of time investment.


Well, having grown up near "the" Sauerkraut region in Germany - I'd say don't.

Honstly, I hadn't ever thought about why until today (can't have been only lazyness that my ancestors left the kraut in peace until done.), but:

Why making really sure to create a water-seal when you are breaking it with stirring? The kraut is supposed to ferment under the absence from air! You are supposed to check on the kraut regularly and even fill up with saltwater, if if the water level is too low. If even the smallest bit of cabbage sticks out from the brine, you risk mold.

Besides, I'd be afraid to drag something nasty into the half-done kraut (and I'm so not implying that your utensils aren't clean!).

I'm adding a detail from a classic fermenting pot: note the groove at the top which is supposed to be filled with water. The lid sits in this, ensuring the seal. The two stones are supposed to weigh the kraut down (what you do with the second plastic box).


Is it ok to use milk that incubated for 12 hours but did not set for yogurt in baked goods?

From a conservative food safety perspective, the answer is no. The USDA suggests you discard any milk in your fridge after a 4 hour power outage -- surely your 12 hour incubation has more potential for bacterial growth. Baking is not a sufficient substitute for sterilization. Although the internal temperature of your baked good will probably reach boiling, it will not stay there long enough to guarantee all harmful bacteria are destroyed.
In yogurt making, you rely on cultured bacteria to acidify your milk. This acidity not only "sets" the yogurt, but protects it from the growth of further harmful bacteria. If your yogurt did not set, it is likely that the cultured bacteria is dead; perhaps you got a bad starter, or maybe you overheated it. In any case, there is not sufficient acid in your old milk to protect from harmful bacteria.
Some cooks regularly use slightly spoiled or soured milk, like Dan Barber in this interview. Pasturized milk goes bad in a fairly consistent way: according to this National Geographic article, first it goes through a souring processes with the growth of Streptococci and Lactobacilli. Only then do yeasts, molds, and Bacillus bacteria begin to grow, usually resulting in a strong smell of ammonia. The Streptococci and Lactobacilli are safe to consume (in fact, they are the same bacteria you tried to introduce to your yogurt), but the Bacillus can cause foodborne illness. This supports the idea that "slightly" spoiled milk could be relatively safe.
However, I would highly recommend you simply discard spoiled or possibly spoiled milk. It is a shame to waste milk, but hopefully once you perfect your yogurt making process this will be a rare occurrence. Ultimately, milk is pretty cheap and foodborne illness is pretty unpleasant. If you want to use a fermented milk product in your baking, just buy some: store-bought cultured buttermilk is safe, cheap, consistent, and delicious.


How can I choose good avocados at the supermarket?

Depends on if you'll buy for instant consumption or for storage.

If you want to eat/prepare them right away, you want an avocado that feels soft on the inside, when pressing them they will cede and have that soft feeling ripe avocado has. It shouldn't cede very much though, as those are past their prime. The very good ones even smell in a nice avocadoey way a bit (or maybe that's just my insanity.)

If you want to prepare them later, you want firm ones that cede only a tiny little bit (the rock hard ones mostly never ripen in my experience,) you then store them in a porous bag (the typical brown paper bag or a newspaper) to let them ripe. To speed up the ripening, you can add an apple to the bag.

See also this related question


Any additional ingredients should be incorporated after the first proofing.

So after your bread has been set aside to rise in a warm place and doubled in size, knock it back to release the carbon dioxide, then add in your mustard any way you want.

It might be worth rolling out the dough, spreading the mustard along the inside, and then rolling up the dough and cutting it into small pieces to create the swirls.

The bread should then be shaped as you want it and left to rise for another 30-45 minutes or so. After all this it should be good to go.


Recipes will generally call for either dry milk or fresh milk. You can (and probably should) always scald fresh milk. You can freely substitute dry milk (either regular non-fat dry milk or "bakers dry milk") for fresh milk by reconstituting the dry milk per package instructions. You can also substitute the other way (liquid for dry) by replacing an equal amount of the water in the recipe.

"Buttery sweet dough emulsion" is not a bread product. It adds butter flavor and sometimes other flavors (usually vanilla) to sweet baked goods like cakes and danishes.

Regarding diastatic malt powder, you should check the label on the flour that you're using and make sure that it doesn't already contain it. Most "normal" bread flours are just wheat, but be aware of any mention of malt or barley in the ingredients. Those words would probably mean that there is already diastatic malt powder included. Assuming your flour is all wheat, you can replace a very small portion of it with diastatic malt powder. Figure 0.5% to 2% by weight, don't go any higher than that.

If you're just getting started with bread, look for good recipes first. Altering bread recipes is fraught with peril if you're not an expert.

These sites are good places to start:

http://www.kingarthurflour.com/

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/


Why is it dangerous to eat meat which has been left out and then cooked?

hobodave's answer is most of the way there but I think it understates the importance of protein toxins.  With the vast majority of foodborne illnesses, the bacteria aren't particularly harmful at all; what you need to worry about is the protein toxins they produce.

E.Coli - probably the most well-known form of food poisoning along with Salmonella - is actually a harmless bacteria that already lives in your lower intestine.  But there is a particular strain of E.Coli, notably O157:H7, that is primarily associated with food poisoning.  The reason?  It produces what's called a Shiga-like Toxin.

E.Coli contamination is actually dangerous on two fronts.  Because the bacteria are so well-adapted to surviving in the human digestive system (as I pointed out earlier, that's their primary habitat), ingesting even a relatively small number of the bacteria will result in them multiplying and producing those toxins in your gut (and the rest of the way down).  This is why it normally takes several days for you to feel the effects of this type of food poisoning; that's how long it takes for them to produce the toxins in sufficient quantity for your body to notice.

But they don't need to be in your gut to produce those toxins; a piece of meat at room temperature provides good enough conditions and more than enough raw material for them reproduce and emit those same toxins.  So if you leave it sitting out too long, then it really doesn't matter how many bacteria you kill, you are going to end up with E.Coli poisoning fast, because you don't even need to wait for them to produce the toxins; they're already there.

The problem is that you can't "kill" a protein toxin with a brief burst of heat because a protein isn't alive.  It's just a protein.  The temperatures and times needed to destroy that toxin would be similar to the temperatures and times needed to destroy all of the protein in the food, draining all the nutrition value and quite possibly turning it into a lump of charcoal.

Salmonella seems to be a fountain of misinformation with all sorts of people saying that it doesn't produce toxins.  This simply isn't true.  Inside the host it produces what's called an AvrA toxin (which isn't "toxic" per se, but allows the bacteria to grow to larger numbers), and some strains can also produce a CdtB toxin, which is highly toxic.  (Apparently there's also a similar toxin produced by other strains.) I'll be honest, a lot of the medical mumbo-jumbo is way beyond my ability to comprehend, but it seems that a lot of the public confusion comes from the fact that salmonella can do some nasty things even without the toxins - but that doesn't mean that the toxins themselves can't do plenty of damage even if you manage to kill the bacteria.

The same applies to many other types of dangerous bacteria; C.diptheriae produce the diphtheria toxin, C.botulinum produce the botulinum toxin (botulism); even the infamous mad cow disease was, as far as we know, caused by a protein, not a bacteria, which is why it was able to be transmitted to humans even through cooked beef.

Are protein toxins the only reason why the USDA insists on a maximum 4-hour cumulative danger zone?  Probably not.  As hobodave says, the more the bacteria multiply, the harder is to kill all of them, even at high temperatures.  The figure of 74° C / 165° F that the food agencies give us for poultry is not going to kill exactly 100% of all the bacteria, and if it only kills - I'm just throwing out a number here - 99.999% of them, that may be good enough for relatively fresh poultry but won't be enough if you've got a whole bacterial colony to worry about.

We can only speculate as to exactly what's entailed by the "danger zone" but my guess is that it's actually a combination of statistics, probabilities, and safety margins, which include, but are not limited to, the effects of protein toxins.


Non-glass baking containers for both microwave and oven use

The material you'd want is silicone.

For example, there are silicone baking molds. They are often used in professional kitchen settings, but I'm sure you find find some online. Here's an example.

There are probably other kinds of silicone containers that can handle oven well, and they can definitely handle microwave.


How to know what temperature cling film is safe to heat to

It depends on the country since what is classed as safe differs although there are lots of common points.
My own summary from the below English, Irish and American food standards are

Unless a cling film is specifically marked as not safe for microwave use, it must be suitable for use in the microwave under EU law.

In general, cling film should not be used in an oven as it can melt and could contaminate the food.

Check with the manufacturer

While the Food Standards Authority in the UK does not have specific recommendations about microwaving with cling film, the Irish and American equivalents do. The Food Safety Authority of Ireland and The United States Department of Agriculture both advise that cling film should not touch food during cooking.
When using cling film, you can also check the packaging for any specific instructions, but interestingly you don’t have to choose cling film that is labelled ‘microwave safe’. Unless a cling film is specifically marked as not safe for microwave use, it must be suitable for use in the microwave under EU law.

Source for above quote

Can cling film be used in an oven?
In general, cling film should not be used in an oven as it can melt and could contaminate the food. However, there may be cling film available which can be used in an oven, so it is advisable to check the manufacturer’s instructions on the cling film before use.
Can cling film be used in a microwave?
Check the manufacturer’s instructions to see if it is safe for use in a microwave. If using in a microwave the cling film should not touch the food

Source for above quote
And finally

What containers and wraps are safe to use in the microwave oven?
Only use cookware that is specially manufactured for use in the microwave oven. Glass, ceramic containers, and all plastics that are safe to use usually will be labeled for microwave oven use.
SAFE TO USE:
... (content removed to keep it brief)
Wax paper, parchment paper, heavy plastic wrap. Do not allow plastic wrap to touch food; vent it to allow a steam escape.
NOT SAFE TO USE:
... (content removed to keep it brief)
Food cooked in any container or packaging that has warped or melted during heating.

Source for above quote
Related: Which plastic wrap is okay for oven use?


Amazon offers several "Bubble Gum Flavoring" or "Bubble Gum Extracts" in both "Natural" and "Artificial" varieties. While the manufactures don't list specific ingredients this is one recipe:

  Here is my basic bubble gum recipe based on "10 parts..." the key is really in the wintergreen, cinnamon and clove.  Fruits can vary a bit-but you will find this to be the "ticket."

  3 parts banana flavor 3 parts pineapple flavor 2 parts wintergreen, 1
  part cinnamon and 1 part clove.

  As I said Bubble Gum flavor is complex and not just one or two notes.
  The oldest formula included a fruit like "king fruit" or "passion
  fruit" but I find most any tropical flavor will pull through.

Whether you (or various manufacturers) choose to use "natural" or "artificial" versions of these flavoring is an individual choice, but it is clearly not limited to "Just artificial chemicals".

Beware that wintergreen oil is quite poisonous: as little as a teaspoon can be fatal. The Drugs.com page on it contains the following: "The highest amount of methyl salicylate typically used in candy flavouring is 0.04%." "Because of this toxicity, official labelling requirements have been changed so that no drug product may contain more than 5% methyl salicylate."


Pure microwave: no way
Microwave with combo/grill functions: maybe.

I bake cakes in a combo microwave oven and results are pretty good, using manufacturer suggested pans and specific recipes.


Does frying a lot of oil out of Twice-Cooked Pork leave it with much less fat?

If you render out fat, there will be less fat in the final product...it figures.  Getting rid of all of the fat, is probably not possible, or desirable.


I'm not sure what your problem is exactly. Just get a precision scale with 0.1g accuracy?


I have difficulty finding "ANGOSTURA" bitters, is there any substitute?

You could try Peychaud's Bitters (difficult to find), Fernet-Branca, orange bitters or other types of bitters.  Worcestershire sauce may also be used as a substitute but works well in savory dishes. I wouldn't recommend it for a Manhattan.

Or, if you're very ambitious you can try to make your own bitters, although the ingredient list is somewhat intimidating! Good luck!

http://spiritsandcocktails.wordpress.com/2008/04/22/how-to-make-bitters/


Turn leftover icing into buttercream icing?

It will if you add more icing sugar but you may end up with a lot of buttercream depending on how much of the icing you have left. A basic ratio is 4 cups icing sugar to 1 cup of butter and 1/4 cup of liquid which makes 3 cups of icing. You may have to add more icing sugar, then more butter to compensate for the water if there's more than 1/4 cup in your original biscuit icing.


Handbook of Indices of Food Quality and Authenticity p474:

  The most important coffe substitute is undoubtedly chicory
  ...
  Chicory itself is reportedly adulterated by roasted beetroot
  ...
  Barley, malt, rye have been used...
  Seeds which have been used include chickpeas, peanuts, soybeans, other beans
  ...
  Date seeds contain less extractives than coffee...

All are roasted somehow.
Coffee: Related Beverages gives some roasting directions, but I don't immediately see a protocol for date seeds.

Roasted Kentucky Coffee Tree seeds are even still used occasionally.

If I wanted to grind date seeds, I'd smash them with a hammer first. Many seeds are unbelievably tough until broken.


Why does salt prevent soy milk from curdling in hot coffee?

I can't find any definitive answers to this question online. All the discussion I could find are speculation.

Factors that cause soy protein to coagulate are heat, acidity, and the presence of magnesium or calcium salts. Additionally the proteins are more likely to curdle if they are heated very quickly.

I will assume that you heated your coffee and milk identically with and without the salt. If you had changed the order of adding boiling water, for example, it could have prevented your curdling.

If you have hard water then there will be a good amount of calcium salts in your water. Coffee itself also has a good bit of magnesium. These salts will coagulate soy proteins more readily than acidity.

Sodium chloride does not cause soy proteins to coagulate. Sodium chloride ions will replace calcium ions- this is used in water softeners and soaking beans.

My suspicion (which to prove would require more experimenting than I have time for right now) is that the sodium ions are preventing the calcium and magnesium ions from coagulating your soy proteins.


Senbei (Japanese Rice Crackers) are made with already seasoned rice paste... However the glaze that makes Senbei attractive is added after the crackers are cooked... This may work for your rice cakes. The "glaze" is simply a combination of low salt soy, and honey which is then dried off in a hot oven after the crackers have been baked.

Could you possibly use a similar process to flavor your crackers?


Detergent Contamination of Processed Foods

Food processing plants have strict regulation to comply with, which means washing the equipment often. Most places wash the machines with detergent at the end of the shift or batch.

It may be quite possible for the detergent to get stuck in places or not rinsed perfectly and next batch of food picking it up.  Their main goal is to not get caught with bacterial infections.  Seems that you were the unlucky buyer of the first pieces of jerky coming out after a wash.

I'm not aware of published statistics for soap in food, and it is also less of a liability for them even though soap can be carcinogenic.  This kind of stuff is not rare by any means.  You decide if an anonymous base wage factory worker is where you'd like to place your trust when it comes to food you eat.


Shrimp can have up to 0.25% STPP, fish even more!

STPP reacts with calcium or magnesium salts. These are commonly found in pool PH buffers, or as gypsum (food grade gypsum is used as a tofu coagulant)

1 Kg of shrimp could have up to 2.5g of STPP, so a 1/2 tsp of a calcium or magnesium salt dissolved in hot water, and diluted to 1 l, would make a neutralising bath for 1 Kg of shrimp. Leave it in for 10 or 20 minutes and rinse thoroughly

It may also react with citric acid (used in baking), or just use the juice of a small lemon instead

The only problem with this is it may leave a soapy taste


How can I cook a full chicken with skin on it when my oven is broken?

If you are intent on cooking the bird whole (as opposed to butchering it into pieces which you can fry in a pan), then your only option would be to braise the bird in a large pot, preferably a Dutch oven.  There are myriad recipes online; search for "Chicken in a Pot" or "Braised Whole Chicken".  As ElendilTheTall mentioned in the comments above, the only other option to keep the chicken whole would be to use a barbecue/grill.


I would steam them, let them cool, then freeze them.  If you buy them in large quantites from a vendor or from a fund raiser or something, they come already steamed.

As for prep, I would think the microwave is the best answer, as that ought to keep them nice and moist while they are cooking.  Steaming them again would probably work, but might take a while.  And while I haven't tried it, I suspect an oven might dry them out too much.


How should I prepare kola nuts for creating a soft drink?

There are several cola recipes on this site.
Recipe 2.6 references a kola extract recipe from the following book: Food Flavourings, by Joseph Merory, AVI Publishing Company, 1960.

I'd assume that the kola nuts are added as in pieces, similar to how they are consumed - Kola nuts are consumed by breaking them open and into pieces.


Oil in this case is only used as a lubricant. You can use any food grade oil you like. Most recipes will probably work best without distorting their flavor, so a neutral oil (refined sunflower, rape/canola, or just "vegetable" oil) will work well. Using the cheapest oil you can find will not hurt your bread.

In a few cases, the oil is supposed to give flavor to the bread. For example, a focaccia should be covered in oil. In this case, you should use the oil mentioned in the recipe, even if the application method means that you will lose some expensive oil. But this is an exception tied to specific breads. For a pizza dough, you are unlikely to ever taste a difference between oils, unless you happened to use something very assertive which changes the dough taste (e.g. nigella).


Do you want rye bread, or do you want "the taste you may associate with rye bread?" (caraway seeds)

If you want bread that tastes like seeded rye, caraway seeds will get you 99.5% of the way there - they are rather overpowering and appear to be what most people "mean" when they say "rye bread" in my experience. They can be put in wheat bread without most people being any the wiser as to the actual grain in the flour.

If you want it marbled, mix some molasses or carob in part of the dough.

If you are not in some terribly inaccessible/inconvenient location, ordering in rye flour should be possible, though you might make sure you have checked all the markets in the area, as what a "supermarket" might not have, a "health food store" or cooperative market might. In some cases, the "baking aisle" won't have what you want, but some other aisle in the same store will (natural foods or some such.)


Almond milk, rice milk, soy milk, coconut milk (but not the kind from the can, something like So Delicious or Silk brand sells), hemp milk, oat milk, or many other nut or grain based milks will work.


Lifting the lid on cooking rice - is it such a big deal?

I am going to assume you are cooking the rice on a pot rather than in  rice cooker. If you are cooking it in the rice cooker, you wouldn't need to lift the lid to check for done-ness. However if you are cooking in a rice cooker, the lid should not be immediately lifted off after it says it is done cooking. You need to let it sit for about 5-10 minutes so the steam can continue to cook.

If you are cooking in a pot, the main reason why you do not want to lift the lid is because you want a even cooking temperature throughout. Typically when you cook rice(once again I am going to assume just plain white rice), you start the water/rice mixture by boiling it on high until it comes to a boil. I do recommend stirring it at this point. But not after covering. Then you set it to very low and cover and let it simmer for about 15-20 minute or more depending on quantity. By doing this, you can evenly cook the rice throughout so that the rice isn't too overcooked on the bottom. If you continue to lift the lid, the temperature would drop, and the top would be less cooked than the bottom. So you would need to cook it longer for the top to be cooked while the bottom is being overcooked.

In addition, the steam that is escaping is the water that you put into the rice. thus when you lift the lid, the water is escaping and will result in the rice being dryer than optimal. If you want to add more water, this will slow the cooking process on top of it already being slowed by losing temperature when you lift the lid. This will result in slower cooked rice.


How to barbecue marinated chicken drumsticks

Alton Brown has an interesting technique in an episode of Good Eats in quite a bit of detail.

But, what I just do is to put it on direct heat (right over a medium-high flame) to sear the skin side and then move to indirect heat (burner right below turned off, other burner still on) and cover to complete. I will admit I've burned it a couple times, but every time I do, it's cause I've forgotten to check it, and left it without checking it.


Water activity is the big issue in preventing microorganism growth in sugary solutions.

Water Activity of Foods Table     Includes limit points for various types of bugs. A few molds will grow down to 0.60Aw.

Another foods Aw table

Water Activity of Sucrose and NaCl Solutions     From which: 180 g sucrose + 100 g water will give you a 64% sucrose solution. That'll have a water activity of 0.87, which is low enough to prevent proliferation of most bacteria, but not molds or quite, yeasts.

Oh yes, the question: A water activity below 0.8 will prevent growth of most molds, so at room temp. your syrup (Aw ~.85) will likely eventually pick up some mold, but not much in the way of bacteria.


Really, any sauce you use with other savory meet dishes can be nice on chicken wings. Options include:

BBQ sauce
most Asian ready made sauces at your grocery store (teriyaki, sweet and sour, etc., even better make a homemade version of one of these sauces)
honey mustard
melted butter (or extra virgin olive oil) with garlic, Parmesan cheese, and your favorite herbs
lemon or lime juice & salt (possibly add honey if you like it sweet)
vinegar & salt
real maple syrup and salt
peanut butter and jelly sauce (some of these recipes include chilies, which you can ignore)
you can even wrap wings in bacon, for a dryer but quite flavorful wing


What does it mean when you feel bubbles pop when kneading bread dough?

This is completely normal and actually what you want bread dough to do, the bubbles mean that your yeast is active, and your bread will rise. However, bubbles that are too big can be undesired in your finished product and may actually cause the bread to cook unevenly. I make sure to eliminate all large bubbles during each kneading session. The presence of these bubbles means that you have a fair amount of gluten developed in your dough, which will ensure you get a light fluffy and well risen result.


How to prepare tiny salted squid for cooking?

Those are meant to eat with rice, though you can it on your own. They aren't really salted, they were steamed with some salt, then frozen.


Putting half thawed joint of pork back in fridge to fully defrost?

Frozen food should always be thawed in the refrigerator no matter what, here's an explanatioon :

frozen food put on the counter will defrost quicker than in the fridge , but bacteria activities will occur, now bacteria activities will occur no matter what, but if you keep it in the fridge the amount of bacteria will be less than if you left it on the counter.

That being said, I would check what the temperature on the surface is, if it's between 2 and 5 degree celcius than I would assume it would be safe for consumption if you let it finish defrosting in the refrigerator, otherwise might as well throw it away because when you get to the point of completely thawing your joint on the counter, the surface will be swarmed with bacterias and will most likely make you sick.

So in a shell : temperature on the surface is key.

Hope it's not too late !


Discolouration when boiling green vegetables with lid on

See mines's link. Also, leaving the cover on a pot of boiling water increases the pressure inside the pot, which raises the boiling point, which in turn increases the temperature of the water (as it can no longer bleed of excess heat through steam). This principle is used by pressure cookers to get the water really hot to quickly cook the contents.

Basically, you're overcooking the vegetables.


You sure can. Bake the casserole for a while longer at 350, just crank up the heat (to 500 even) at the end to get the browning on the top after you remove the other stuff. Casseroles are very forgiving by nature.


Macarons//egg whites with sugar are not sifting

Make sure that your bowl and wisk are grease-free before adding the egg-white. And make sure that not even een little bit of the yoke gets in the egg whites.

The fat prevents the egg whites from stiffening when mixing.


Well... sounds a little weird but you could search for military recipes. They usually have the ingredients amount for 100 people.


Difference between "real mayonnaise" and "mayonnaise dressing"

According to Duke University:

  Believe it or not, there's a standard of identity for mayo.
  Mayonnaise, as defined by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration must
  contain vinegar, egg or egg yolks, and at least 65% oil by weight. It
  may contain spices and natural seasonings except turmeric and saffron,
  since yellow color might suggest added egg yolk.

You can also review the complete standard.

Therefore, anything that does not meet this requirement cannot be marketed in the US simply as mayonnaise.

Reduced fat dressings, do not have the same amount of oil (necesary to meet the standard), since they need to eliminate it to reduce the calories.   Instead they emulsify in additional water via stabilizers.


Using both cook and serve pudding and instant pudding in pie

I doubt it would make the milk curdle, but it may mix with the other layers if you pour it in while still hot. I would cook the layer with cook-and-serve pudding and let it cool in the pot until it's more spreadable than pourable. It should be just about room temperature by then, and then you can layer it on top of whatever layer it's supposed to be on without any worries. If the butterscotch is the first layer, you can pour it hot into the pie shell and wait until it's cooled before adding the other two layers.


Dissolving xylitol in a raw, home-made chocolate

I believe that sugars are usually suspended in chocolate by emulsion - emulsifiers, like soy lecithin, are sometimes commercially used and may improve sugar staying suspended in the chocolate - which may answer part of your problem, if you can find some to try it.

But I think the real answer to how sugar usually stays suspended in chocolate lies in mechanical emulsion, where sugar is mixed into chocolate and stays suspended in fine particles.  Commercial chocolate does so in the 'conching' stage of chocolate production - where the chocolate is mechanically ground very fine for hours or days, giving a minute particle size to both the cocoa solids and the sugar granules.

Homemade chocolate using cocoa powder and cocoa butter don't usually need conching, since the solids are already ground to a fine powder - but your xylitol may be slightly coarser and so is apparent in the mixed chocolate as a gritty texture.  Perhaps home chocolate making uses powdered sugar, or the sugar dissolves more easily into the chocolate butter, or in the mouth when tasting, I'm not sure.  I don't think you can add something to make your xylitol dissolve or distribute better, though, as it will probably make the chocolate seize.

You might try grinding your xylitol (with a mortar and pestle, or a spice grinder or what have you) till it becomes a fine powder - if there isn't already a finer grind available, which would be less work. This should also help with settling since the smaller particles will be lighter, although you might need to keep stirring until it's thick enough, or plan to cool quickly enough after it is poured, so that it doesn't have time to settle.


why use a pressure cooker for collagen to gelatin conversion?

What you need for the conversion of collagen is a certain amount of energy. It is a complicated process - the melting point is around 70°C for the type of collagen contained in beef, but the melting does not happen instantly once the meat reaches 70°C. In a pressure cooking, you can apply the same amount of energy in a shorter amount of time. This is not bad, as opposed to slow roasting of collagen-poor meat.

In collagen-poor meat, you have two types of protein, which are soft and wet. Under heat, they curdle, becoming tough and dry. The perfect meat is when the first type has curdled (so the meat is not raw) but the second hasn't, so it still holds juices inside. If you curdle both, your meat gets tough and you can't take it apart with your teeth.

In collagen-rich meat, you curdle both proteins - the collagen itself is tough and you want to melt it, but this happens long after the meat has curdled. But because the muscle fibers are not clinging to each other, but separated by collagen, you still get tasty meat. For that, you melt the collagen into gelatin, and serve the meat warm, so that the dry fibers are separated by the smooth, juicy melted gelatin. Unlike slow-roasted meat, you don't have to tear the juiceless fibers apart, and the gelatin makes up for the missing meat juices which were expelled from the cells during curdling.

So, in slow-roasted meat you don't want to cross the temperature limit for curdling a certain protein, this is why you have to apply heat slowly until the center of the meat has cooked, without the outside getting overcooked. In collagen-rich meat, there is no upper limit at which the meat gets non-tasty, so you can push the energy needed for the collagen-to-gelatin conversion quickly into your meat. The pressure cooker can do this better than the normal boiling process.


Is it possible to get crispy, crunchy carrots from canned carrots?

No, once its [over] cooked that's it, there's no going back.

If you dry them you will eventually get… you guessed it - dried, cooked carrots. Think 'packet soup' minestrone, or the unfortunately named 'spring vegetable' with salty knotty chunks of partially reconstituted ingredient - a childhood delight.

Once the cell walls are gone, there's no rebuilding them; nor will you ever get them to taste like fresh food again.

Canning is a 'heat-blast' technique to ensure only that the contents are absolutely sterile. It is not a technique which at all concerns itself with the texture or flavour of that result.

If you like canned carrots - & someone must, they seem to sell enough - then be happy with canned carrots.

If you like fresh, then you have no choice but to get them fresh.

If it's pure laziness (you said it, not me ;) then supermarkets sell them ready-prepped… baton/julienne, round cut or grated. They cost more [but so do canned] & they taste unsurprisingly almost exactly like ones you prepared yourself.


Probably not. The enzimes in the yeast and flour break down among others the gluten, which is responsible for the dough structure.
Some reading material on enzymes

  Too much protease activity would break up the gluten, destroying the network that forms during kneading. A little bit, however, softens the dough and makes it more workable. If the dough is allowed to autolyse (i.e., rest) or if preferments are used, proteases have time to work before kneading, making the dough easier to knead.

I would say this is rather "over-leavening" than overworking. (Over-leavened breads stay usually flat.) But the additional punches probably also helped breaking the remaining gluten chains.


How exactly are you making them? This might affect the answer.

I assume you're using some sort of mold. If that's the case, plunge the mold into an ice bath, but don't completely submerge it. Assuming your mold is metal (molten sugar is hot!) they will cool rather rapidly although I can't give you an exact time.

In general, an ice bath is the way to go for rapid cooling. You could get it a little cooler by adding a generous dose of salt to the ice bath, but meh I think you'll only shave a few seconds.