What does "heat the oven to broil" mean?

In general, there are two types of ovens:

Ovens with a broiler drawer under their oven.
Ovens with a second top heating element (broiler) in the main oven compartment.

Your oven is the former; mine (and apparently the author's) is the latter.

So, in this case, the instructions mean "heat the oven to the broil setting".

Since you have the first type of oven, your only option will be to put your oven in broiler mode and hope the distance between the broiler and the fish is sufficient. With the recipe calling for the fish to be on the middle rack, it sounds like it's pretty far from the heat source, so you'll probably need to keep a close eye on your fish as I'm guessing your setup will be much closer. It's even possible that it won't work at all.


Why did rust appear after my first layer of seasoning?

Are you sure it is rust and not oil residue? Is it sticky?

In your case, I would try to clean the pan by heating it on the stove with some water in it. Use low to medium heat. Once it's warm, use some balled up tinfoil to agitate the surface of the pan. If it's really caked on, drain the water and try repeating the process with some beer or liquor as a solvent..that will usually do the trick. Wipe down with damp or dry paper towels to remove residue. Repeat steps until clean.

Once clean, I typically air dry or heat the pan back up on the stove on low heat to get rid of any residual moisture. While it is still warm, lightly soak a paper towel with vegetable oil and wipe the whole pan down so that it is lightly coated in oil. This will prep it to be cured in the oven (so the oil doesn't spoil)

To cure it, I usually don't set the oven too hot. 350 degrees Fahrenheit or so for 30 minutes is usually good enough for me. The point is to get it hot enough to cook the oil but not to burn it. Afterwards, I will wipe it down lightly with a dry paper towel if there is any excessive amount of oil and just let it cool in the oven with the heat turned off. The pan should be somewhat shiny in the end.

Hope that helps.


Goat Cheese is dry compared to many other cheeses.  We make a goat cheese pizza but have to moisten the shredded goat cheese with goat milk into a kind of slurry.  Very low in lactose and tastes good but it doesnt even melt much because it is so dry.  Probably lower in fat too I would guess.  If your espuma is too dry try adding more goat milk to the mixture until it just moves in the blender.


If you don't mind losing some of the juice, try breaking them before cutting them.  Use a potato masher or meat tenderizer or something like that to break them into pieces.  That way they won't roll around when you're trying to cut them up.  Once they are in pieces, you can lay them out on a cutting board and chop away.  You can also put several on a cutting board and mash them down with another cutting board on top.  That will make them less spherical.


my cookie dough was in the fridge overnight and now its rock hard can I microwave it?

I'm going with a tentative "yes, but" here.

First let's have a look at what happens in your dough and why most recipes recommend refrigerating the dough before baking.

A "basic" cookie dough consists of fat, flour and sugar (plus a few extras, obviously) that form a delicious, crumbly substance after baking. The secret to the way the cookie crumbles (pun intended) lies in the way the fat separates the flour and any kind of liquid involved to inhibit gluten formation - which would translate to a tough and rubbery cookie. But the fat must remain in small, yet coherent pieces (even if we don't see them in the cookie dough), which will melt during baking and create tiny "shards" or the delicious buttery crumbs of our cookie. A very extreme example of the mechanism is puff pastry: layers of dough separated by thin layers of fat.

A dough with lots of fat will be soft at room temperature (perhaps even too soft to work with) and firm when cold. So when a dough is too firm, letting it warm up a bit is the obvious and correct choice.

But if you use your microwave, you could easily warm it up too much - making the dough hard to handle and you might have to cool it again. There is another issue if you warm your dough just a bit more: Did you ever heat butter in the microwave? It melts quickly and it does so unevenly. Some parts are still soft, others runny. This can easily happen to the fat in your dough as well. But if you get liquid fat, it can't fulfil the "form pockets and later crumbs" requirement stated above, affecting the cookie texture negatively.

So my conclusion:

The safest method is to take the too-firm dough out of the refrigerator and simply wait until it's soft enough. If you want to speed the process up a bit, choose a warm spot. Shaping the dough into a disk instead of into a ball before refrigerating will help the dough warm up more consistently, but not all doughs are firm enough to be shaped (but I suspect it's possible in your case).
If you absolutely must use the microwave, do so very carefully, on the lowest setting and in short intervals to prevent the fat from melting.


I would say cashews and peanuts are not traditional Italian. Pistachios and hazelnuts are commonly used for desserts, think nutella for example. Pine nuts (pesto) and chestnuts are also traditional. It might not what you are looking for, but nutmeg is a common Italian spice.


I am by no means a cast iron expert, but I like mysteries.  So, I have been doing a little research about your question.  As @Max points out, a picture would be very helpful, but a raised straight mark on the bottom of your pan is known as a "gate mark". Gate mark casting was used in the 1800s, and could very well signify that you have quite an old piece.  The line comes from the piece actually "breaking the mold".  The ring, if it is also raised, is known as a heat ring.  Since these pans were made to work with wood fired stoves, the ring was meant to raise the piece slightly above the surface.
I have been unable to locate a reference to "BR".  Is it possible that the B is actually an 8?  Numbers were often cast into vintage pieces to indicate size. Some companies added letters, known as "pattern letters", to indicate the mold pattern.  Could it be 8 R?
There is lots of good information here.
From your brief description, it appears possible you might have a piece that is quite old, perhaps from the early 1800's.
Given your photos in the update, it's tough for me to tell if it is an 8 or a B.  I've been unable to locate any images that match your pan.  However, using the link above you can work your way through a list of foundrys.  Many do not have pictures, unfortunately.  I've scanned the most obvious ones, thinking that if it is a "B" it might be related to the name of the producer.  No luck.
However, that site has a link to a discussion forum.  Perhaps you could post your pics there.  That way, a real expert could point you in the right direction.
By the way, if you do identify it, please return to add your answer here.


How to fully incorporate cream cheese with pumpkin puree?

When mixing cream cheese with softer or more liquid ingredients, you first need to make sure both things you're mixing are softened and smooth.

Even room temperature cream cheese is sometimes hard to mix. I usually microwave it in a glass bowl for 30 seconds then beat it until it is smooth. A food processor or electric mixer will make this easier.

In a separate bowl, beat the pumpkin puree (or whatever else you are mixing in) until it is smooth.

Now take a few spoonsfull of the pumpkin puree and add them to the cream cheese. Mix until smooth. Add more of the purée, mix. Eventually it will all be incorporated, or if the cream cheese mixture becomes liquid enough, you can add all of it in.

If you're mixing the cream cheese into something more solid like almond paste, reverse the process and start with a couple spoons of cream cheese in the stiffer ingredients.


Can I use Granulated sugar instead of White sugar?

If the sugar you have is actually coarser than "normal" white sugar (say, crystals are more than a mm in size):

If the recipe calls for dissolving the sugar (eg by vigorously stirring it into the wet ingredients), there is no difference at all - just make sure you dissolve it fully, coarser sugar takes more time/work to dissolve.

If the recipe calls for mixing the sugar with the fat or with dry ingredients first, sugar grain size makes a difference in texture - which will likely not ruin the cake though. If you want to be sure, you can make the sugar finer using any of a (dry!!!) blender, coffee grinder, food processor, mortar and pestle...


Refreeze ground hamburger as hamburgers after thawing?

Never re-freeze raw meat. I have run 2 commercial food establishments and had to be qualified in food safety so this is what I know...

The freezing process arrests any of the bacteria in the meat from causing putrefaction but as soon as the meat defrosts these bacteria start their work again at an accelerated rate, re-freezing will cause a repeat action and food poisoning will ensue. And ground or minced meat usually has a higher bacteria level due to the extra handling, increased actual surface area due to many smaller bits and the fact that those tiny pieces warm quicker.

If you want to freeze individual hamburgers, make them up as soon as you get the mince and freeze what you don't want to use straight away.

I hope this helps


Do cocktail onions need to be pressure canned

In canning, you can't make up your own recipes. There are too many "gotchas" which you cannot predict or measure. So while in principle yes, acid will make a low-acid food cannable in a water bath, just taking a recipe meant for other use and canning it is not safe. And you have to follow it exactly - if the recipe is for cut-up onion for example, you cannot use whole onions.

There likely are recipes for canning pickled onions, look around for those, and try them out.


How to figure the calories in a boxed cake mix if applesauce is used instead of egg and oil?

The nice thing about calories is that they are very constant, mixing or combining things does not change the sum of calories.

So in short, calculate the calories you add (the applesauce) and the calories you leave out (eggs, oil). Add and subtract these from what the box says and you're done.

If the box gives calories per unit or serving, you'd first have to calculate the calories for the whole box, then do the adding / substracting step, then, if wanted, divide the results into servings again. (The Rule of Three comes handy in these cases.)


How important is the creaming process while making a cake?

The purpose mixing the butter and sugar until creamy is to distribute air through the batter that will help leaven the cake in the oven. Skipping this step can create a denser cake.   You want to add the air into the batter before adding the flour in order to prevent over mixing, which creates gluten; causing a tougher texture.

Beating the eggs until foamy and folding them into the batter or adding the eggs to the butter/sugar and beating until fluffy will also create a lighter texture.

The sugar does not need to dissolve in the butter, but it should be evenly distributed. This site gives a good visual on how creamed butter & sugar should look.


My once black cast iron skillet is now dark silver on the inside. Have I ruined it?

It sounds like you may have scrubbed the seasoning off your pan.  It is not ruined, but will need to be re-seasoned.  As you can see on the right (if accessing the site on a computer), where it says "related", there are a number of links to questions and answers about cast iron seasoning.  If you are accessing the site on another device, you can search for "cast iron care", or "cast iron re-seasoning" using the search bar.


I've successfully frozen yuzu (a Japanese citrus fruit slightly similar to lemon or grapefruit) zest for two or three months without much damage; the flavor isn't perfect, but it's usable as long as you don't get serious freezer burn. I've kept it in a small Rubbermaid container. There is a potential problem because citrus oils can damage certain types of plastic over time, but this didn't affect me; however, plastic bags won't work so well.


Is very slow smoking of meat allowed commercially in the US?

There are several additional questions that your original question brings about, if you are in the context of the USDA and regulations.  Whether or not the USDA allows for this kind of sausage production is a different question to whether or not there are producers who are actually doing it.

Are you interested in producing the sausages yourself to sell, or are you just looking for people who might be producing them for you to buy?

The USDA website for its Food Safety and Inspection Service, who would likely regulate this kind of production, is here:  https://www.fsis.usda.gov/wps/portal/fsis/home

This would be where you would look to find out if the regulations prohibit the production, or if there are specific prohibitions to ingredients or processes that are part of the production.


What is the difference between Dutch Pie and German Pie?

The one called, "Dutch pie" is typically a very smooth pie on a cookie base. The one called, "German pie" generally has a layer of crushed nuts on top of the smooth chocolate icing.


Cooked or caramalized onions in the refrigerator

For cooked onions, you can find one answer here: http://www.stilltasty.com/fooditems/index/17825

3-5 days in the refrigerator.
refrigerate withing 2 hours of cooking.
refrigerate in covered container or wrap tightly with heavy-duty aluminum foil or plastic wrap.


Some convection ovens have the ability to turn off the fan -- if yours has one, that would be recommended.

One of the big issues is that the cooking time changes based on the surface area of the item being cooked -- so if you have a thin cake, such as a jelly roll (baked thin, then rolled up), your cooking time will be dramatically reduced ... but it doesn't help with large cakes -- you'll just end up with the top browing faster than the middle sets.

In general, the recommendation for convection ovens is to lower the temperature by about 25F / 15C (some newer ones with digital controls will do this automatically), but some people report problems with cakes being overly dense; I've heard different theories (eg, bernoulli effect lowering the pressure in the oven, causing the air bubbles to come out of the batter).  Adding a tight covering of aluminium foil might help this, but it will cause other issues (eg, steaming the top).

Another recommendation I've seen for baking in a convection oven is to make sure that your oven has had sufficient time to pre-heat, then when putting in your baked goods, turn the oven off, and leave if off for 3-5 minutes before turning it back on.  (this is typically to solve problems with baked goods appearing lopsided, as the fan's blowing so hard it's moving the batter around significantly).


I copy / pasted this, as it is the guide I have used, and it is wonderful:

First: Lose the big pot of water. Instead, retrieve a medium-sized skillet (10-inch diameter) that has a lid. If your skillet doesn't have a matching lid, try on some of your other lids -- one of them is bound to do the job. If not, you can cover the skillet with a baking sheet or large dinner plate. All right, go to the sink and fill the skillet with about 3 inches of water -- that's all. Put the skillet on high heat. Cover it to speed up the heating time. Meanwhile, for 4 eggs, crack one each into four small cups or bowls. You can use coffee cups, little Asian tea cups, custard cups or the little poaching cups that from the poaching set you will no longer be using.

Second: Put all cups of eggs on a plate, and have them convenient to the stove. When the water in the skillet boils, remove the cover. Add one tablespoon of plain vinegar to the water, and some salt. Vinegar helps the egg to hold its shape. Without it, the eggs will become skeins of protein tangling up in the water. When the salt goes in, it will actually raise the temperature of the water. Watch the bubbles. I happen to like the vinegar taste on the finished egg. If you don't, put the finished poached eggs in a bowl of water. This stops the cooking and washes away the vinegar. If you like the vinegar, try a splash of herbal, apple cider, or sherry vinegar.

Third: Lower the lip of each egg-cup 1/2-inch below the surface of the water. Let the eggs flow out. Immediately return the lid to the pan and turn off the heat. Set a timer for exactly three minutes for medium-firm yolks. Adjust the time up or down for runnier or firmer yolks. While the eggs cook, you have the time to make four pieces of toast, set the table, wash the empty cups, and put the buttered toast on plates. When the timer goes off, remove the cover. Ah! Lift each perfectly poached egg from the water with a slotted spoon, but hold it over the skillet briefly to let any water clinging to the egg drain off. Gently lay an egg on each piece of toast. And there you have it. Perfect poached eggs actually cooked in residual heat and not in the literal sense of the term, poached at all.


I will put this as an answer as I might be too long winded for a comment.

The US, and most places have agencies that set food and food handling standards.  I will not get into if those standards are the best, right, too high or low, ect., only state that those standards are when the agencies have deemed qualify as safe.  I will also not comment on how well those standards are followed and enforced, only that they are in place, and should in general be followed.  There purpose is to assure the public that what they eat and what they use to prepare food meets a reasonable health standard.  If, in my opinion, one does not assume that items made within that country and imported by reputable sources into that country do not adhere to those standards, then you will simply worry yourself needlessly over everything.

On this specific question, kitchen towels/paper towels/paper rolls, etc. are specifically manufactured for kitchen and general household use.  They should therefore be manufactured to food grade standards.  Should you simply eat one?  Well no, but it is not going to hurt you if you do.  It is paper and a bit of dye.  As intended for kitchen use, the dye is food grade, not fabric dye or such.  Is bleach used to make it, yes, more than likely since bleach is a common item used to make such paper, but there is not deemed to be enough residual to be a health risk, and certainly not enough to be a contact risk from draining of blotting food.  That does not mean it is recommended to start shredding them up and use them as a food supplement.  It means that board review says causal contact with food is OK.

That does not mean that any paper or cleaning towel is OK to use.  If it has been treated with cleaning or polishing solutions, like disinfection wet towels, those are not for direct contact with food.  It is not their purpose, and yes, they might very well make you sick.

Is plastic safe?  Well, it depends on the plastic.  If it is food grade, then yes, as long as it is used reasonably and as intended.  Take a thin zip lock bag and super heat it, well, that is not how it was intended to be used, and you may well have broken its integrity.  Use it to store a piece of fruit in the refrigerator for a day and it is fine.  Go to the hardware store and get a plastic bucket to mix something in?  NO.  That is not food grade plastic.


You do want a coarse grind for french press coffee. The key is letting the coffee steep for long enough to make a strong brew. I have good results with a 5 minute steep time. Be sure to use a timer, and compare different times to find the optimal brew. As a general rule, if you are at altitude, then you need to add time because boiling water is cooler. (Note that I am at 5000ft, so 5 minutes may be too long for you.)

Below is a picture of the coffee chunks in a coarse grind on top of a US 5 cent coin (21.21 mm in diameter).

The picture is from this article.

EDIT: The reason to use a coarse grind for a french press is that finer grinds will get stuck in the filter and/or push their way through. This has three potential problems: 1) it will be harder to press down the filter, possibly leading to spillage or breakage; 2) your coffee will have grinds in it; 3) the coffee may become bitter, as the finer grinds that passed through the filter remain in contact with the coffee for too long.


How long can i keep home made caesar dressing?

Up to 7 days (homemade mayo as well). Egg whites/yolks out of the egg (but not combined with the acid) can last 3-4 days refrigerated, and eggs in-shell are good for 2-4 weeks depending on processing.


What is the best frying pan for even heating, using a large pan on a much smaller burner?

Aluminum and copper are the best heat conductors you'll find in a pan (actually they are about the best heat conductors in general). Get the thickest you can get/afford, possibly a layered (clad) construction.


Shelf life of items stored in vacuum containers vs airtight non-vacuum ones?

It's true that keeping air away from most foods will increase their shelf-life, but so-called "vacuum" food containers can't possibly create a powerful enough vacuum to remove all the air. I would be suspicious of glowing reviews with wild claims of their effectiveness.

For the purpose you described, I think you would be much better off using a good quality plastic wrap. Pressed tight against the food all the air is removed and the cling-wrap plastic makes an air-tight seal.

For a fraction the cost of what you're considering, invest in a heavy plastic wrap box that has a sliding cutter.

Because you don't have to struggle with this kind of box, the plastic wrap doesn't get tangled up. You can cut off exactly the amount you need, so it makes sealing up foods very fast and efficient. You can refill such a box with inexpensive store-brand, but it's worth paying a few cents extra to buy professional grade plastic wrap because it stretches and seals much more effectively.

Plastic wrap can be used to seal or augment the seal of most any container you already own, so your choice of size and shape is limited only by the width of the plastic wrap roll.

You can also do things like line a bowl or cup with plastic wrap to hold it while you add the food. Sealing the plastic will form an air-tight, liquid-tight seal that can often stand on its own for refrigerating or freezing.

Although it can sometimes be reused, there's also the big advantage of being able to simply toss the plastic wrap in the trash or recycling bin instead of washing it. Plastic storage containers ("vacuum" or otherwise) are notorious for retaining food odors, and attempting to sanitize them in the dishwasher doesn't always end well.

As Catija points out in the comments, a vacuum sealer is another option to know about.

While it may not be cost effective or practical for everyday leftovers, vacuum sealing in plastic with a machine is beneficial when freezing, marinating, and for sous vide cooking.


How do I properly wash bugs out of green onion?

I'd cut the root off (so you have a green onion 'straw') and run water through that. This would leave the onion soggy. At this point I would lay out some paper towels at the bottom of a vase and leave the green onions upright for about an hour - switching the paper towels every 20 minutes if they get too damp. After said hour, store in a cool place.

Do note that by cutting the roots of the green onion you considerably shorten their lifespan in storage. However, you can then take the roots and plant them (after soaking the roots in 1/4 water-to-root-height ratio) to get more green onions :)


If you have a chamber vacuum sealer, you could vacuum seal your spices and extend the shelf life. Oxidation is the problem here.  Ground spices are just limited by surface area exposure.  Whole spices, ground as needed, will always be superior.  Your best solutions are to purchase (or grind) small amounts, and use them relatively quickly...or, use a coffee grinder or mortar and pestle to grind whole spices as needed.


Best way to Store and Rewarm Fried Chicken

Nothing you do will be perfect but here are a few things you can do to help.

When done frying dry well in a dry space.

Sealed spaces will trap the moisture released by the chicken as it cools. Refrigerators are natural moist spaces as well. You will want to do this on a drying rack to prevent the chicken sitting in its own runoff juices. Use of a fan will speed up the process and allow you to get the chicken in the fridge sooner for safety reasons.

Store with a desiccant of some kind.

Can't find a desiccant? Don't want to use those little packs that come with your new shoes that practically screams Don't eat me!? Well I usually just use a paper bag. Add a few paper towels if needed. Rice and salt can be your friend too.

Reheating is easy Fryer or Oven.

I prefer fryer because it will come out closest to the original that way. However it is also easier to break the delicate crusty exterior. The stronger your coating the better chance of succeeding with this (Note: for items that don't have a fragile exterior like French Fries this almost always works great.) One way to ensure your coating is stronger is to have rested it after applying the coating for some time before the actual initial frying. The Oven however works well too and I prefer this method for larger batches for sheer convenience. I go with a lower temperature of 300 degrees F in order to achieve more internal heat before the exterior begins to burn but feel free to adjust for your needs.


Every recipe I've ever seen for homemade clotted cream has mentioned that layer under the clotted cream.

Clotted cream is essentially clotted milk solids (similar to butter or cheese, but obviously made quite different, and with a different taste), and the leftover liquid is analogous to the whey left over from cheese making or the liquid that remains after churning cream into butter.

It's likely that using a higher fat content or raw (as in fresh from the cow this morning) cream may result in less leftover liquid, but I've never tried it to be sure-- perhaps someone with more experience can tell us.


Leaving hard boiled eggs in water for several hours

The strictest rule of food safety says ' In temperature danger zone (40-140 °F or 4-60 °C) for a total of six hours, with only two hours allotted to get through the 135-71 °F range (57-22 °C).

So, let's suppose the eggs went from boiling to room temperature in two hours. We cannot say that the cooling time was even throughout the temperature range, as cooling is proportional to temperature difference, so it cooled faster when it was hotter than the surroundings. Therefore, the eggs likely cooled half the way in the first half hour, then the other half in the next 1 ½ hours (rough approximation.)

Your eggs were brought off the boil, presumably at about 200°F / 93°C and sat for two hours. We do not have cooling data, but it cooled some amount , then draining and in the fridge means cooled to 40°F well within 6 hours. The guideline would state that it was above 71°F for more than two hours, but we can interpret this:

At boiling temperature, there was little or no chance for any bacteria. You then started to cool them, but any previous bacteria are dead. A small amount of airborne could be introduced, but again, a small amount. The eggs were then brought to the safe storage temperature.

Throughout all of this and the guidelines, the eggs spent a little too much time above 71°F, but not much.

Eat them. Enjoy.


Surely it is some sort of gimmicky bacon pan. You lay the bacon over the hump and clamp it down like you would with a bacon press, then the trough-like sides catch the grease.

I could see it maybe being used to make naan bread. Once it's puffed up you clamp the top down and flip upside down to blacken the bubbles like would happen in a tandoor. Seems like a little bit of a stretch though.


One solution is to make your own peanut butter.

If you have peanuts (preferably roasted; if you have raw peanuts, toss them in the oven on a baking sheet in a single layer at around 350 F for about 10 minutes, maybe with a tbsp of peanut/vegetable/canola oil), throw them in a food processor or blender and let it rip. Scrape the sides of the bowl periodically. You'll (eventually) end up with peanut butter.

If you want chunky, run the food processor until the peanuts are chopped, reserve a portion of them and then run the food processor until the rest is smooth. then, put the chopped peanuts in and pulse to combine (or just stir them in).

Season with salt and sweetener (e.g. honey) to taste.

For more details, just find a recipe like this one from The Kitchn or this one from Alton Brown.

Note that this is going to be relatively expensive versus just buying a jar of peanut butter.

The usual substitutes for peanut butter are other nut butters like almond butter. See this question for some common substitutions. Or, make a different type of cookie.


How do big companies can products at large scales?

What I've seen (on TV, not in person) is typically somewhat different than a home process - the food is sealed in the cans (raw) and then run through a giant pressure cooker, typically on some sort of conveyor system, and spends a number of hours being cooked in the cans at the same time as it's being "canned" (heat-processed to kill bacteria) - at least this seems to apply to canned beans. Labels are applied after the can has cooled.


I overseasoned my food, what can I do to remove the strong smell?

The most important thing first: You can't remove the smell. If you are interested in reducing it to hopefully tollerable levels, and/or understand why this is so, read on.

This may seem very broad, but really, there are only very few strategies which you can try, and I will list them here. A word of warning: don't get your expectations too high. Only under some circumstances can you turn "terrible food" into "great food". In many cases, you have to settle for "acceptable food that's still somewhat off" or even "unsalvageable".

How does aroma work

There are molecules in your food which are volatile - they waft through the air. When you eat, they reach your palate and nose, and come into contact with receptor cells. The receptor cells send signals to the central nervous system, which processes that signal and gets activation of all kinds of brain nuclei, with one of the main results being that you realize "oh, this tastes/smells like X". There are thousands of different receptors, each responding to a single molecule, or a family of closely related molecules, and each food exudes hundreds of these perception-triggering molecules. The combination of them is what triggers the recognition of your food as smelling "of X". The reaction of the nervoius system is mostly triggered by the stimulus of the smell molecules docking onto the smell receptors, but it uses all other information avaliable to it - percepts from other senses (taste buds, visual stimuli, etc.), memories, emotional state, etc., to form its reaction and prioritize its "place" in your attention.

The job of the olfactory perception system is to discover new olfactory stimuli (aroma), react in a dose-dependent manner (it differentiates the spectrum between "it has a hint of sage" and "the sage taste is overpowering") and point your attention towards that information.

Note that our olfactory system is highly efficient - there are molecules which are detected at a concentration as low as a few parts per billion in the air - and that your brain doesn't respond linearly to the information provided. Some stimuli get more "air time" in your attention than others. This is especially devious when you hate a given aroma - your brain will concentrate your attention on even very small amounts of it.

The possible strategies

There are only a few places where you can hook into that process, with differing rate of success.

Reduce the concentration

If you can apply this strategy, you are most likely to get success in the sense of turning unpleasant food to pleasant. The prerequisite for such success is that the aroma was pleasant in the first place (so not the aversion case and not something like burnt food, these cases fall under the "nonlinear response" part of the background info) and that it is physically possible to change the concentration. But even in the aversion case and unpleasant smell case, it is frequently worth applying it if the unpleasant smell is moderate - it just won't be a complete success.

The strategy differs on the type of food you have. If the smelly ingredient is still present in distinct chunks in an otherwise stirrable or reordeable food (soups, stews, stir frys, some casseroles), you can just remove the chunks. Do take as many out as you can, even if you are left with zero of the original - chances are that even when the ingredient is completely gone, it will leave lots of its volatile molecules dissolved in the liquid phase of the food, or soaked into some of the other solids.

If you have a stirrable/reordeable dish and the ingredient cannot be removed because it is a liquid or a very fine powder, the way to reduce the concentration is to dilute with more of the same food. You have to make one ore more additional batches without the ingredient, and mix with the original batch. This is the most effective strategy, and has sometimes to be applied in addition to the "removing chunks" strategy for smelly ingredients.

If you cannot mix another batch into your food (e.g. you overdid the vanilla in a cake) or don't have the ingredients for another batch, you can still dillute the whole dish by extending it with new ingredients. For a cake, serve it with copious amounts of whipped cream, or with a creme anglaise sauce. For a stew, add more vegetables, and/or turn it into a soup by adding stock. If you have made a spicy green sauce, consider turning it into a dip by mixing it with 2-3 times its volume in yogurt or other dairy. An important point here is that there is no "magic ingredient" which somehow counteracts smells, no matter how many myths you hear about that. Just go for anything that adds a lot of volume per bite.

In some rare cases of shelf stable foods, you can absorb the excess smell. For example, if you made sugared petals and added a volatile essence that overpowers everything, you can keep them in a box with a bag of activated charcoal for a few weeks and see how much it has helped.

Reduce volatility

This is a somewhat unusual way to go. But there are ingredients which "trap" molecules so they are not as good at reaching your receptors. They are typically thickeners - xanthan is especially effective. Note that not every thickener will work, for example starch doesn't seem to have such an effect. The drawbacks:

you need a fairly liquid food to apply them, and it will be much thicker afterwards. Also, you are limited in how much you can use, for example xanthan will give you a snotty effect if overused.
all other aromas will also be reduced. You can try compensating by adding more seasoning of other types after the thickening, but you can't duplicate all of the flavor.

Distract the senses

As mentioned above, at each second, there are tons of sensory percepts vying for your attenetion. Even when you eat and try to concentrate fully on your food, the different aromas of the food arrive at once, and some are more noticeable than others. Also, the other sensory modalities mentioned can help.

Here, you can go very straightforward, for example by using something else that is fairly strong in smell and/or unusual for you, creating a stimulus which will compete with the undesirable aroma for attention. You can also use your sense of taste, and add something that strongly triggers it, again to outcompete the smell. Of course, if you overdo it, you will end up with a food which is unpleasant for another reason. Another strategy is to go more subtly about it, and add something which reduces the presence of other sensory information related to the smell - for example, if you used too much coconut in your yogurt, you can color it in a shade not associated with coconut at all, maybe a light purple. This will not be sufficient to combat your problem on its own, but it is worth doing along with other strategies.

What doesn't work

In practically all cases, there is no "antidote" which will magically neutralize the aroma you dislike and create an edible result. As we said above, the aroma is created by thousands by molecules, not by a single one, and it is impossible to find some chemical substance that will react with all of them (or even the worst offenders) and leave it clean. Rare exceptions could exist, where you react to a single molecule and there is the perfect ingredient that reacts it into something very different, but I can't come up with an example now.

There are also no selective "sponge foods" which go in, soak up the smell actively, and then your food is clean again. Foods which are rumored to work that way usually turn out to be simple dilutors.

Also, remember that you will never get rid of the smell entirely - see the part about our sense of smell reacting to parts per billion. You can only tone down its effect. So the more offensive the smell is to you, the less likely it is that a rescue attempt is worth the effort.


Can I use caster sugar instead of cane sugar?

Yes you can, so long as you work by weight not volume. Unrefined cane sugar (or refined sugar with some molasses added back in) would contribute a little to the flavour, but sugar mainly provides sweetness, and in brewed ginger beer, a source of nutrients for the culture.

Caster at the same volume as granulated would be too sweet (the finer crystals mean more will pack into the same space), but at the same weight it would be fine.


How can I reduce the salt in oversalted potatoes?

Basically dilution is the key, though a rinse and a short soak in fresh water will help a bit.

You could freeze them in small quantities and use them up in vegetable soup a little at a time. Don't forget that commercial stock has quite a lot of salt in, so reduce that accordingly.

Some thick stews could tolerate some mashed veg in them, again in fairly small quantities.

By mixing with completely unsalted veg you could make a form of bubble and squeak, but you'd have to mash/mix it more than normal to avoid having locally salty bits.


Rice cookers excel at just making plain rice, and all you need is uncooked rice and water. If you go beyond that, though, there are possibilities galore. For instance, I like adding a couple tablespoons of olive oil to my rice cooker at the start of cooking; I find that it makes the rice softer and more interesting. Salt can be added as well, or you can substitute various liquids for some of the water.

So, if you just want plain rice, start with rice and water. If you want something else, then what you should start with depends completely on what the "something else" is. Experiment! The worst that can happen is that you waste some rice.


Recipe asks for "15 cardamom pods, crushed". Do I keep the shells?

To get ground seeds I usually pound the whole pods once or twice in a mortar. The seeds should separate from the husk easily then. Remove the entire pod from the mortar, and grind the seeds.

Is this recipe for a marinade? You might get away with just crushing the pods, not separating the husk and seeds.


You will obviously need to refrigerate.  If it is only 12-hours, I would cool, then leave it uncovered in your refrigerator, or maybe a loose draping of plastic.  For longer storage, I would wrap well and freeze.  Reheat in a 425-450F (218 - 232C) oven until just warm in the center (test with a cake tester by inserting into thickest part, wait 5- 10 sec., and touch to your lip). The pastry should come back, but probably not to its original glory.


Adding parsley at the beginning of making chicken stock

It certainly does make sense - adding herbs at the beginning of the process (not just parsley) gives them ample time to infuse their flavor into the stock. I regularly do so along with other herbs: rosemary, thyme, or whatever else is on hand.

This is an optimal place to use up dried herbs (I'm fairly sure a lot of kitchens have a sad, half-used container of dried parsley stuffed in a cupboard; might as well gets some mileage out of it). There's really no need to use fresh parsley when cooking for an extended period, as much of the light, fresh, grassy flavors will be destroyed during the long simmering. In fact, some fresh herbs can even develop a pronounced bitterness after lengthy cooking; I haven't noticed this with parsley, but you might if using a lot of it.

So sure - add your parsley right when you start making your stock, and feel free to use the dried stuff that you can't readily substitute for fresh in other places. The only exception is if you really want to get those lighter, fresher flavors; then there's really no substitute for fresh parsley. You'll have to add it toward the end of cooking, and plenty of it to make sure you get ample infusion.


Do I have to adjust anything to add seeds to bread?

I think the substitution should be straightforward.  From the recipe, the dough should be able to handle that amount of seeds.

My main concern would be with hydration level.  Seeds can pull some moisture out of dough, which might make the bread a little dry or stiff.  But the type of seeds you're talking about shouldn't absorb that much water, so it may not be a huge issue.  (This probably needs a couple tablespoons of extra liquid, roughly within the "error range" of the recipe already.)

I'd "play it by ear" and see if the dough seems drier than usual.  If you plan to do this substitution more than once, you can see what happens the first time and add a little water if necessary in future batches.  (You could also try soaking the seeds first, but that seems unnecessary to me with these types of seeds -- nevertheless, that can give you a sense of how much water they might absorb if you measure the water and then measure the amount your pour off after soaking, before adding the seeds to the dough.)

The other issue is that you'll simultaneously be adding weight to the dough while removing some gluten (by removing a bit of the dough).  Now the bread has to support more weight, so you need to ensure the gluten structure is strong.  I personally would consider substituting some bread flour rather than just AP, which will help support the extra weight.  (That could also affect the moisture level of the dough.)  And/or you might add a "stretch-and-fold" maneuver halfway through the first rise (or maybe two), just to ensure the gluten has maximum development.

Finally, oven spring will be a bit less, so you'll want to wait until the dough is clearly risen enough before baking.  You also want to be careful not to remove too much excess dough when substituting the seeds, or you may not fill the pan to the top during the bake.

But these are all rather "picky" things.  Chances are if you just did the substitution you suggest without any other modification, things will turn out OK -- maybe somewhat dry, and maybe with the loaf a little denser in the crumb toward the bottom.


If you want to boil something in your microwave, you certainly can. I doubt it'll be as power-efficient as doing it on the stove, but it's possible.

But there's no formula to get you a time and power level. You probably want to heat on maximum power until the water boils, then heat on the lowest power setting which keeps the water boiling until the octopus is done how you want.

On top of that, depending on your microwave, even the lowest power setting may be too high, and cause water to boil away enough that you'll need to replenish it eventually if you're cooking for an extended period.


Well, there is a pan especially for flan (Spanish), they call it the Flanera Flan Maker:

It doesn't appear to be intended for use with a bain marie, I'm pretty sure it's intended to eliminate any need for a bain marie (although I have never used one for flan).

Here's the link: Flan Pan


Do cinnamon, mint and saffron turn bitter?

cinnamon, mint and saffron are bitter.

You probably know that "flavor" is roughly 90% smell. Our tongue identifies only the basic tastes, such as sweet, sour etc. When you "taste" mint, your tongue identifies a sour-bitter mixture, and it's your nose that absorbs the citrusy-herbishi-whatevery aromas that we call "mint".

When you cook spices, and especially when you overcook them, the gentle volatile aroma compounds veporize away or are destroyed by the heat. And you're left with the plant material, sometimes wilting, mostly without the smell.

Now, of course the "tongue" taste of these herb and two spices is not straight-out medicinal bitter. But I guess it's not what you meant either. It's just.. a bit yakkish, on the bitter side, right?

Here's what I do to avoid it: I add gentler spices towards the end of the cooking. Say, in a slow cooking dish, I'd put a whole cinnamon in the beginning, but the fresh chopped mint will be added only when I serve it. So to your question - yes, it's heat and quantity. Put more, heat it less.


How to cure beef jerky with a minimum of salt?

The salt in the cure inhibits bacterial growth (particularly if the salt is one made for curing, and contains nitrates). So you should be warned that you are trading a few blood pressure points for enhanced risk of foodborne illness.  Unfortunately, I think your options are rather limited -- either to keep the salt as-is, or forgo jerky in your diet.


How can I use corn meal more efficiently when making pizzas?

When I first started making pizza at home, I tried cornmeal then tried semolina.
Neither worked to my satisfaction

Despite that the box of Reynold's Parchment paper says 'Oven SAfe to 420 degrees F', I tested it at 550deg F for 30 minutes at 550 deg F (the max temp my oven can be set to) on a heated pizza stone with a 10" cast iron skillet on top. The parchment turned a light brown, there was no fire and the structural strength remined (I pulled on the paper to slide the 4+ pound skillet back onto my peel without it tearing)

I ceased using corn meal or semolina from that moment. No more pizza mess in the oven


I left a fully cooked honeybaked ham out overnight, and i am planning on making it into soup-is that ok?

Using the ham and the bone would be great for soup! The ham has already been cooked (cured) and since it has been left out in the "Food Danger Zone" has probably had bacteria grow on it. However cooking the ham (boiling it in soup) above 212 degrees will kill any bacteria that may  have developed. Also you may want to consider putting the ham and bone in a pot with water only, bring it to a boil and then dump it all into a sink and colender. This will get a lot of the fat or scum out of the soup. Then put the ham back into the same pot, add your stock or water and seasoning with carrots, onions etc. You will have a lot less skimming. Just don't eat the soup cold or let it stand out.


When turning instant soup into liquid soup, how can I optimise dissolution?

Add the water incrementally. It's probably enough to add just a bit, stir, then add the rest, but you can break it up a bit more if that doesn't work.

A clump of powder or a lump of paste won't dissolve easily into water, but it's easy enough to add a little water to it and thin it out. So the idea is to work your way up from powder to paste to thinner paste to liquid. This is a good idea for all kinds of things where you start with a powder or a thick paste, not just instant soup.


What is the typical consistency of a roux?

Roux is very forgiving, and can be made a variety of consistencies, or ratios of butter to flour.  It should only be brown if you are intentionally making a brown roux, for the flavor.  Otherwise, it should be fairly yellow, closer to the color of the butter.

At the canonical ratio of 1:1 butter to flour (by volume), the consistency will be thick enough not to flow, but certainly not as thick as wet sand.  (When refrigerator cold, if you store it, it will be quite firm and thick, scoopable with a spoon with some effort.)

You can heat the butter at any speed you like consistent with not burning it.  You can heat it at fairly high heat until the foaming begins to subside, which indicates that the water has been boiled out.

I generally recommend adding the flour after the butter is melted, and stopped bubbling (which indicates the water is gone.)


Why does fondue sometimes "curdle" and what can I do to prevent it?

Normally, you start adding the cheese when the wine is simmering and stir regularly as you add it. If necessary, you can add a tablespoon of corn starch dissolved in some white wine to homogenize the mixture.


No. As you noted, searing beef performs what's called the Maillard Process (or Reaction) which is a specific form of caramelization. Nothing is "sealed" into the meat because the meat isn't sealed by the process. It's still porous and will therefore leech moisture during cooking. You can retain moisture in cooked beef by buying quality beef and not cooking it beyond medium-rare to medium.


Mine takes 40 minutes for 500g flour, just under 70% hydration. That's in preheated cast iron, with the lid on (and wetted inside) at 240C for the first 20 minutes, then down to 180. The hard crust seems like too hot to long, possibly too much top heat too.
Did you let it cool (almost) fully before cutting and tasting? If I'm impatient, it seems doughy and underdone. The absolute warmest it should be when you cut it is just warm enough to soften a little butter. The inside looks OK to me - a closer crumb than you might have been aiming for but better for sandwiches. I'm prone to handling mine too much or too roughly and knocking some of the air out as I transfer it to the pan, with this effect
Next time try turning the oven down a bit when you take the water out. To avoid wasting this loaf, if it still seems underdone when cold, toast slices of it (probably leaving the crust) and eat hot with butter.


Whenever I put breadcrumbs on chicken breast, they turn out soggy and moist

The classic method of breading ("Wiener Schnitzel") is a three-step process:

flour
Only a thin layer: you can add salt or spices to the flour instead of or in addition to seasoning the meat.
egg
Lightly beaten (not foamy); let excess drip off well.
breadcrumbs
Either fresh or dried, the egg helps the crumbs to adhere. Lightly pressing the crumbs to the meat is optional.

But there is a fourth component that will ensure your success: fat
Yes, we are all trying to "eat healthy" and monitor our fat intake, but unfortunately fat plays an crucial role in good breaded food. Whether it's deep- or shallow-fried, the hot fat ensures a good heat transmission and quick setting of the breaded crust, thus locking moisture inside.
Your GF grill is an excellent kitchen tool, but defeats the purpose: Your crust can't bake quick enough in the dry heat and touching the hot surface only partially. Combined with the heat from the grill and a significantly longer cooking time, the moisture that steams out of the meat will literally be drawn into the crust - leaving you with sub par results.

Save your GF for other uses and use a pan with some oil to fry your chicken.

Side note:
Some recipes for fried chicken recommend baking the floured chicken pieces in an oven to save fat. Note that a fried chicken is typically a two-step coating with an outer layer of flour, so slightly other rules apply.

Nevertheless, this method might be an option for you and worth a try, but don't expect the golden crust you get from traditional frying. I have used an oven with breaded meat, but typically with partially fried food, so that the breading already contained fat / oil from the first round of frying.


Will it wreck the dish if I pre-soak beef in brine, and then slow roast with Marsala?

Do it! Marsala is sweet, brine is salty. You may be on to something here...

Really though, I always brine anything I roast or sous-vide. No issues here.

EDIT: I would recommend using olive oil instead of butter if you are still worried. Not to mention Marsala + olive is delicious.


A lot of smoke when using induction stove with any recipe with oil

What kind of oil you're using would be helpful but, really, the answer is, whatever temperature it is you set it at, it's too hot.

Turn the temperature down.

The temperature gauges shouldn't necessarily be trusted to give you a perfect temperature reading. You can use an infrared thermometer to test it but your result tells everything, really.

If your gas stove was underpowered "high" heat may not have really been that high and the induction stove is probably stronger, so you're overheating your pan.

Since you added your oil usage:

Olive oil is a very low smoke point oil (325-375°F/165-190°C), so it should never be heated so much. Some sesame oils are also pretty low (350-410°F/175-210°C), depending.

Vegetable oil (400-450°F/205-230°C) is much better. Soybean or peanut are even higher (450°F/230°C).


What can I use instead of powdered milk to turn dark chocolate into milk chocolate?

Milk chocolate is made with powdered milk; adding a liquid will make it break or it'll be unable to set. If you add something with enough fat to keep it from breaking, like coconut milk, you'll end up with a delicious chocolate ganache, but it won't set like a chocolate bar. I would instead look for a vegan milk chocolate; some companies are making them with coconut milk solids. You may have to order them online.


Can I use brown sugar instead of white sugar in making fruitcake?

When substituting brown sugar for white sugar, be mindful if you are measuring by volume. Brown sugar packs down a lot and you may end up using more (by mass) sugar than you intended.

Your cake will be tasty. You may notice a slight texture difference, but it should be fine.

Alas, it will still be a fruitcake.


What are the ranges of Pork Temperature that are flavorful and safe?

The main goal with temperature is to kill anything nasty. Those nasties die based on temperature and exposure. Much like a human could live forever at 95 degrees, for a long while at 110, shorter while at 150, and would die instantly at 750, so for all the stuff in Pork. 160 is considered a safe temperature because at 160, everything dies instantly. The FDA has a chart for all this, here. You'll see that even 120 degrees is safe IF you cook it for 21 hours!

I cook a lot of sous vide, so these temperatures and times are easy to get and be precise about. The thing you need to be careful about is that the time table shows the amount of time that the whole piece of meat needs to be at a given temperature, so make sure you heat it through before you start counting.

I'll regularly do pork chops in the 135 range, and it's lovely and moist without the stringy overcooked texture you get when well done.


Can I dilute double cream with milk to get lower fat content?

This will work just fine. Many people will get the math wrong, but your calculations appear correct. Give it a good stir and everything should come out as expected. Most recipes are sufficiently tolerant that substituting the double cream would likely be fine compared to just using the heavy (if not an improvement).


what is the appropriate cook time for cumin before it turns into a smoky flavor?

Cumin always has a earthy flavour, tending towards smoky especially if fried or toasted.  So if you currently fry the cumin at the beginning you may get some benefit from not doing so and adding it to the salsa when you add the water-based liquids, but the chances are the best thing to do is omit it, or reduce it significantly.  You may then get into experimenting with alternatives, but I suggest doing so in a scaled-down batch.

I went into a little more detail on flavour extraction and temperature in a recent answer.


Beef stew was left cooling on the stove for like six hours

Seven hours is not much, starting with a sterilised stew. Use you senses. Are there bubbles? Does it smell strange? Have a mouthfull, does taste off? If not, I would eat it. In fact, I wouldnt even give it a second thought after seven hours starting from fresh.. but US regulations, yes, would say it cannot be served. Good you are not running a restaurant, but this is just home cooking, er?..


Meat is tough for two reasons:
1- An abundance of connective tissue.
2- When over cooked.

In your case I'd say you probably have both problems. Cheap meat is tough meat. It is from older animals or well worked muscle groups. This means that it has been fortified with a lot of extra connective tissue. It also means it has a lot of flavor.

The solution to #1 is slow, wet cooking that will melt that connective tissue into delicious gelatin. Braising is the normal way to do this. When meat is heated too far, even if the connective tissue has been carefully melted out, the meat proteins bunch up and stiffen- resulting in #2, a dry, unpleasant meal.

You are buying tough meat and cooking it relatively quickly with no thermometer. You don't have enough time or moisture to melt the collagen and you can't be sure you haven't over cooked the meat because you don't know the temperature. Using time doesn't work because chunks of meat are irregularly shaped so you can't know how long it will take for the heat to penetrate.

Buy yourself a probe thermometer to prevent #2. For #1 look for pot roast recipes. Some are easily done in slow cookers- others use a tent of sealed foil over the meat to seal in moisture. Plan on it taking much longer than your 1.5 hours. 3-6 hours are typical to produce a really succulent pot roast.

The searing is just for flavor and will not play a role in either melting collagen or cooking the interior of the meat.


Remove a potato one at a time from the hot water with tongs, placing it in cold water for shock. Wearing dishwashing gloves, while under the cold water pull on the potato skin removing it. Place the skinned potato in a finished container and proceed to the next potato


In all seriousness, it's called pork belly.


Why is my macaroni salad absorbing all the liquid?

Pasta absorbs liquids, because it is made of starch, and starch absorbs water.  Tossing the pasta with oil will reduce the absorption, by coating them in a water-repellent layer.

Beyond this, the solution is simple: don't drain as much water from the cooked pasta, and add more dressing.  There's a limit to how much moisture pasta will absorb.


why a citric fruit rind is cooked several times to make a marmalade

Speaking from a different dish: when I make citrus caramel I have to blanch the citrus peels a few times (three times mostly). It greatly reduces bitterness from the white part of the skin.

Here's Kenji-Lopez Alt's take on it.


Yes, you can freeze it.  Per Eat By Date, it should last 6-8 months when frozen.

The eggs don't really change the ability to freeze it.  For example, you can also freeze raw cookie dough containing eggs.


Why does food cooked in the microwave heat inside-out?

Your microwave isn't exactly cooking your food from the inside out. Instead, what is happening is that some parts of your food that happen to be on the interior are being heated faster than those parts of the exterior that you observe. This sort of uneven heating is intrinsic with how microwaves work.

  Microwave ovens cook unevenly because a pattern of standing waves forms inside the oven chamber, and the pattern creates an array of hotspots throughout the oven's volume. An operating frequency of 2.45 GHz will produce a wavelength of around 12.25 cm, and the regions of maximum intensity (hotspots) will be at half-wave points, or every 6.125 cm, but in a complex 3D pattern

From here

So, in your microwave the waves happen to be arranged just so the inside of your casserole heats up faster than the outside.

In microwave ovens that do not have a rotating carousel, this effect is even more pronounced, although even using a carousel is not a panacea. Many microwave oven recipes often include instructions to rotate and/or stir the food intermittently as a means of distributing the heat more evenly for the same reasons; changing the position of the food within the oven has the effect of shifting the hotspots around in the food as it cooks.

So, my suggestion is to try changing the position of the food in the oven over time, particularly if it's being heated over several minutes, as that should help it heat more evenly. If you can, it is also a good idea to stir the food intermittently as well. Personally, after the microwave finishes the allotted time, I also will stir and then wait a few minutes before serving to let the hot spots naturally dissipate a bit via conduction.


Could you describe the Soufflé technique?

All souffles will fall. Anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something. Souffles rise because of the action of steam within them (I don't have my copy on loan, but this is discussed in some detail in McGee, 2004 edition). Popping them back in the oven briefly will resuscitate them enough to take to the table, if they have fallen too quickly.


Why does fish stick to a pan which is not very hot?

Have you heard of the leidenfrost effect? If you drop a bit of water on a very hot pan, the water floats around on its own cushion of steam, thus not touching the pan at all. Similar things happen when you sear meat on a pan. The steam keeps the food from bonding with the pan.

In general you shouldn't cook meat on a medium heat. Generally you want to cook meat either on a screaming hot pan/skillet with a heavy bottom, or low and slow. Rarely in between.

I have no science to back this up, but watching a documentary on Francis Mallmann, who cooks over wood fires, claim that when the meat first touches the grill it sticks, but once the Maillard reaction occurs the meat begins to unstick. He says he hates it when people touch the meat and move it around, and that its best to just leave it be until its ready to be flipped. People associate cooking things very hot with burning them. But in reality getting a nice sear requires very high heat, which creates many of the flavor compounds in the food we eat. You're more likely to burn or overcook something at a lower heat, because you're cooking out all the moisture slowly then it begins to burn the entire thing very rapidly, rather than browning the outside. Which could also make the food stick to the pan.


How does tangzhong (water roux) make bread softer?

The tangzhong is composed mainly of gelated starches.  According to Harold McGee's  "On Food and Cooking"

  During the baking of bread and cakes, the starch granules absorb
  water, swell, and set to form the rigid bulk of the walls that
  surround the bubbles of carbon dioxide. At the same time their swollen
  rigidity stops the expansion of the bubbles and so forces the water
  vapor inside to pop the bubbles and escape, turning the foam of
  separate bubbles into a continuous spongy network of connected holes.
  If this didn’t happen, then at the end of baking the cool- ing water
  vapor would contract and cause the bread or cake to collapse.

In the Tangzhong, the starches are already swollen before mixing begins.  This means that they do not need to compete with the proteins to absorb water as the completed dough warms up in the oven. As you mix the ingredients the plump starches perforate the gluten-water sheets.  As McGee mentioned, these starch granules' rigidity accounts for the spongy, close structure of the tangzhong crumb, dough with less perforated gluten mesh forms larger bubbles and a more open crumb.

The gluten in the flour used in the tangzhong is denatured by the process before it can form into an extensive network.  However, since the tangzhong accounts for only a small portion of the total flour used, there is plenty of gluten left to maintain structure during rise and oven spring until the starch structure sets.

Other resources:

Tangzhong Water Roux Pain au Lait: Soft, Springy Sandwich Bread


Where did you get it?  Looks like it could be epazote.


I just looked it up. Maple syrup is almost pure sucrose-water syrup. (I know that the colour and flavour are very distinctive, but the molecules responsible for them are a very small percentage by weight). Which means that it behaves just like regular candy crystalization.

The bad news is that candy crystalization isn't easy. There are just too many factors which have an influence on the texture. The good news is that people have already created such recipes. Find such a recipe and follow it exactly to the letter! If it says "wooden spoon", don't use a metal spoon, etc. And don't even start without a thermometer, unless you have had years of experience to perfect your water test technique.

As I haven't ever made or seen this specific candy, I can't tell you which parameter values will give you the needed texture. But I can list the usual parameters which influence the final texture.

As for general understanding, what you have is a saturated sugar solution. When you heat it, water evaporates, making the solution more concentrated, but on the other hand, sugar is more solvable at higher temperatures, meaning that it doesn't get supersaturated when heated gently. When the concentrated syrup cools, it becomes supersaturated, because the concentration doesn't change, but the solvability does. If you give the sugar the smallest chance to form separate largish crystals during cooling, it will do it. For a consistent texture, you must watch following parameters extremely carefully.

the density of your sugar syrup. It is measured indirectly by measuring the boiling temperature of the syrup. The exact temperature at which you must stop boiling will be given in the recipe (don't forget to adjust for altitude, subtract 1°C for every 300 meters). If the recipe only tells you a syrup stage (something like "hardball"), use a chart. Allow leeway for carryover - when you remove a pan from the stove, it continues to heat its contents for a while, so remove two-three degrees early (or more, depending on the pot). You can immerse the pot immeidately in cold water if it has gotten too hot, but this isn't so good for the pot itself.
The speed of hardening. I have a vague memory that you can't use rapid cooling for a non-sandy candy texture, but don't remember it 100% correctly. Rely on your recipe, if it tells you to pour it on a marble slate, do it, or at least use a refrigerated thick metal pan or something similar which cools quickly.
Nucleation points. These are very hard to avoid, but if you need a sandy texture (what you seem to want), it is much easier. If you want to have no nucleation (for a smooth hard candy), you must do everything possible to have no sugar crystals and no impurities in your syrup and to not disturb the pot. This is the reason for most weird requirements in candy recipes, like washing and drying the termometer before each dip, or the abovementioned wooden spoon.
Stove temperature. It must be hotter than your goal temperature, but if too hot, the sugar will scorch on the bottom. Also, the evaporation rate is changed by temperature, which may contribute to supersaturation.
Chemical help. You may need to invert your sugar (use acid, cream of tartar is common - just follow the recipe) or add glucose and/or fructose. This prevents the creation of crystalization nuclei in your supersaturated syrup. You probably don't need that, because it is more important for the popsicle-style candies.
Breaking up crystals. For candies where multiple soft crystals are expected, you may need to manipulate the mass mechanically after the crystalization has started. Kneading and beating are common. They result in the breaking up and mixing the crystals, resulting in a soft mass (fondant, fudge) as opposed to big hard crystals (the ones daniel's method will create). The more you do that, the creamier your texture will get.

As you see, there are way too many variables to experiment with. You could do it, but you'll need lots of luck and patience to hit on the right combination. Pick a recipe, and follow it. If needed, adjust the result according to the guidelines I gave (e. g. kneading more for creaminess).

I just noticed, the site I linked for the chart has a page describing some maple syrup candy types, and lists the correct temperature and basic handling stages for them. Could be a good starting point. (Maple candy page)


cake shrinks when it cools, becomes smaller than cake board

Often times the cake boards are a little larger. The reason is to allow room for icing and a border of decorated piped icing along the base. Otherwise use undersized rounds. Also plain cake rounds are right at the same size as the pan so unless you have mass shrinkage they should be fine and allow you to handle the cake without actually touching the cake.


Different flours (both in terms of brand and even batches of the same brand) have different levels of absorbency, so you often have to experiment a little with new baking recipes. I always need much more water than the recipes in my favourite bread book call for, for example.

The best thing to do is add more flour gradually until you are happy with the texture, then you will have a better idea next time of how much you will need.


Continued use of the same dripping for frying - is it advisable?

Firstly, I would challenge both of your assumptions.

(a) dripping doesn't go off

Like any other fat, lamb drippings can and will go rancid over time.

(b) any germs/bacteria would be killed by the heat of frying

While it's true that any molds or bacteria themselves will be killed by heat, the same does not hold for any toxins they may have produced.
Secondly, when you fry anything, you introduce small particles into the cooking fat. These will burn and -- health risks aside as they are off-topic for this site -- start ruining the flavour of the fat.
You can cook using animal fat rendered from lamb chops, or pork chops, or bacon, etcetera, but you should filter the fat, keep it refrigerated and cannot expect to reuse it indefinitely.


Fondant is nearly solid -- it's rolled out, and placed onto the cake (with a buttercream underneath as an adhesive).  The advantage is that it goes on really quickly and smoothly over large items.  It can also be cut into shapes with rather clean edges (modeling chocolate gives sharper edges, but it's not flexible enough to cover a round cake).  You often see it on professional non-traditional cakes (more novelties, when they need a solid color or something that's strangely shaped.

Fondant can also be used to give a solid background can then be piped into (with buttercream icing, generally) or painted. As it's nearly solid, it can also be worked like you would clay to make decorations.

Royal icing dries hard as it has no fat in it.  It's generally only used on cakes as a drizzle where you're not attempting to cover the entire cake.  You'll often see it used on bundt cakes, but you more frequently see it used for cookies when you're doing a flood-fill.

Buttercream icings (commonly called 'frosting' in the US) is likely the most standard for non-professional stacked cakes.  It's spread on, so it takes a little more work to get a clean smooth surface. (the trick is to wait 'til the surface has hardened, put down some waxed paper, then smooth out all of the spatula marks ... you need to wait 'til the waxed paper doesn't stick, but not so long that it hasn't set up completely).  You can also use buttercream in pastry bags to create flowers, ropes, basketweave and other decorations.

...

And then there's other frostings/icings, too, but they're not as general purpose.  They generally go with specific types of cakes --  caramel and other cooked frostings (eg, used in 'German Chocolate Cake'), cream cheese frosting (for carrot and other spice cakes), whipped cream (used in black forest cake & strawberry shortcake)


Which one is better in Samosa dough,Ghee or Oil?

It depends on the oil otherwise I would recommend ghee, it has a nice nutty aroma and it’s more stable with high heat compared to other oils such as vegetable, canaola and olive oil. The only oil I would use, would be coconut oil.


How does the taste of Bird Eye Chillies differ at different stages of maturity (green vs red)?

This is pretty much the same throughout the pepper family. The green chilis have "green" flavors - underripe, metallic, grassy. The ripe, red chilis develop more rounded, fruity flavors. You can just think of the difference between green and red bell peppers as a basic guide.


You would use the flat bottom spoon as you would use a regular spoon. The main different between the flat-bottom spoon and western spoons is as you can see the flat bottom and the fact that the flat bottom spoons are usually bigger and can hold more liquid. I'm not sure why it would be awkward to use it compared to a regular spoon. You don't need to stick the whole spoon in your mouth. There is a rounded edge around the spoon before it is flat. You put just the rounded portion of the spoon into your mouth and drink from it.

The reason for the larger spoon probably stems from the fact that many Asian soups have noodles and large chuncks of vegetables and meats in it. Using a western spoon, you would get some of the noodle or meat and have little room for the broth. But with the larger flat bottom spoon you can get the noodle, meat and still fit an appropriate amount of broth on the spoon.

EDIT:

Also note that it is common practice to use the flat bottom spoon and the chopsticks simulataneously while eating a bowl of noodle soup. One would use the chopsticks in their dominant hand (right hand lets assume). They would then use their left hand to use the spoon. As you have probably experienced in your life unless you are ambidexterous, using the left hand to do thing you normally do with the right can be hard. With the flat bottom, there is less chance of spilling than with a traditional rounded spoon.


Fudge already set, can you soften and re-set it?

My understanding of the fudge process is that you are aiming to make a supersaturated solution of sugars at heat, which, when cooled, will cause the sugars to crash out of solution all at onece into the fine crystals characteristic of fudge. This is the reason you need to remove sugar crystals from the sides of the pan - so that they don't act as nucleation points, allowing bigger crystals to form.
There are a few different sorts of fudge, some of which will be easier to fix than others. Traditional fudge is the fussiest to get right, but also the easiest to fix if necessary. So called "quick" fudge made with condensed milk or marshmallow fluff is easier to get right, but not as easy to fix, and does not rely on so heavily on sugar crystallization, but rather on protein precipitation acting as .
In principle for traditional fudge you could re-heat it by adding more liquid so that the sugars dissolve. You would then need to evaporate the excess liquid (but don't exceed the soft-ball stage at 237 F/114 C) to recreate your supersaturated solution. Whether this will work or not will likely depend on your skill at maintaining the temperature below the point above, so as to neither burn the fudge, nor turn it into toffee.
For quick fudges, there is some protein content in there from the milk or the gelatin in the fluff, which affect these. You can't really re-dissolve proteins that have precipitated and aggregated, so you will not be able to melt these ones effectively.


Difference between parsley and coriander(cilantro)?

Coriander leaf/cilantro looks VERY similar to flat leaf parsley. When I have both at the house I sometimes resort to smelling them to know which is which.

Cilantro is very strong smelling, and you'd definitely change the flavor of the dish if you left it out.

Flat leaf parsley is significantly more subtle and has a much milder flavor and scent. It is not flavorless, and in a recipe that calls for a lot of it, you'd really be missing something by leaving it out.

When you've got a recipe that calls for both parsley and cilantro, you're definitely going to be more able to taste/smell the cilantro more than parsley, but they'll both contribute different notes. If you have to leave one out, leave out the parsley, but don't try to make up the volume with more cilantro, as you may wind up overpowering your dish. Just leave the parsley out and proceed as normal.

Do not use curly leave parsley in anything--it is tough and virtually flavorless. It is ONLY a garnish and not worth wasting your time on.


There is no conclusive reason to say about safe or not either way.

When an egg is frozen, the yolk changes irreversibly. Even after thawing, its consistency is very different, much thicker than normal.

On the other hand, it may never have been frozen, but have been contaminated by something instead. Or it may have been frozen first and contaminated afterwards.

You cannot say what caused the visible, if it was freezing or microorganisms. So it is unsafe. As for there being something wrong, nobody can tell without a trip to the lab.


Freezing uncooked ‘chicken of the woods’

Welcome Paulette! Your mushrooms should be fine for using in cooked dishes. I would avoid using them uncooked as thawed mushrooms can be soggy/mushy.

We don't have access to any areas to forage fresh mushrooms, but I have bought both fresh (and frozen them) and prepackaged frozen mushrooms. When used in cooked dishes you couldn't tell that they weren't fresh to begin with. Much, much better than anything from a jar or can!


How to make less salty Fermented Black Bean Stir Fry

There are two ways to reduce the saltiness of the finished dish: reduce the amount of salt you put in (in this case difficult, as it is in the sauce, so you'd have to put in less sauce) or increase the amount of water that stays in the finished dish. For the second option I personally have the following strategies which may or may not suit your taste:

add more veggies or tofu or other watery ingredients without salt
add yoghurt or any other fresh topping that contains no salt
also make sure that the tofu you add is not too salty, if possible add plain tofu

or as mentioned in the comment to your question you could make your own sauce, one good recipe I found was here: http://www.daringgourmet.com/how-to-make-homemade-black-bean-sauce-or-black-bean-paste/ It tells you how to transform fermented black (soy!) beans into a sauce and also has some interesting examples how you can use it and it doesn't seem very complicated to do.

Of course if you are adventurous you could also try fermenting soy beans yourself, but that's another story.


Baking soda accident in pretzel dough - Can it be salvaged?

I made this same mistake because I didn't read the directions all the way through.  After realizing what I had done, I did a search and came across this post.  Since I didn't see a response about going ahead and baking anyways, I decided might as well.... I can report back:

WORST. PRETZELS. EVER.

They were extremely bitter and performed terribly in the oven. I cannot describe how bitter they turned out, but compare it to how bitter bitter melon is, douse it in kerosene, light on fire, then put that fire out with baking soda and there you have it.

=€


What happens to the flavour of meat when you cook it Star Anise with Onions?

It is basically the anethole (a phenol) of the star anise that react with the sulfur in the onion to create sulfur-phenolic aromatics.  In Chinese cuisine the same family of reactions is used with duck and pork.

The sulfur-phenols are also produced during the Maillard reaction, the reaction that gives grilled meat its characteristic flavor, so adding star anise to the onions will give your dishes more of that grilled, browned flavor.  The reactions of the compounds in the star anise with those in the meat are not the relevant reactions for flavor or texture.

From averaging a few recipes, I would say 1 star anise for every 250g of chopped onion.  Too much star anise will highlight the other aromas in star anise, so one has to use it in moderation and allow enough time for the reactions to take place.

Garam masala, a common Indian spice combination that is used in meat dishes, may have star anise.  Star anise is sometimes used in French onion soup — it intensifies the caramel flavor of the onions — and in Vietnamese cuisine, which today incorporates French elements.


Which container to use for combined milk?

Don't reuse an old milk jug for storing the new, combined milk. The standard plastics used in milk jugs in most areas cannot be properly sanitized for reuse (even with standard sanitizing solutions).

Instead, use a properly sanitized and covered glass or plastic container, preferably one that you clean in a hot water dish washer.  Milk stored in a properly cleaned container will have the maximum shelf life (and reduced chance of other contaminants).


Subsituting mango puree for bananas in banana bread

Mango puree is quite a bit more acidic than banana; 3.4 to 4.6. vs about 6.5.
Quite a bit more liquid too.
I'd cut to about two bananas worth volume wise, and be quick about stirring in the puree and getting it into your oven. The low pH is liable to set off your rising agent quickly. Take it too slow, and you'll have bread overfilling the pan, or flatbread.


I'm not certain what you are asking?
Are you wanting to start a vegetable stock and use it as a base for the bone stock at a later time ?

IMO that would work.

Do a vegetable stock when you have enough vegetable scraps, portion it and freeze it.

When you have enough bones, do the stock using the vegetable stock use made earlier.


Does the point at which salt is added to a dish affect how the flavor is changed?

Yes, the flavor is definitely affected.

First, there is the point of solubility. Salt doesn't dissolve all that easily in water, and unlike many other crystals, its solubility doesn't improve with heat. So you have to either stir a lot, or let the dish to sit for a longer time after the salt is added, or both. Else you end up with uneven salting in liquid dishes like soups. Thicker things like sauces are very marginal, and if you add salt to cooked dry stuff (steaks, casseroles and whatnot), you're guaranteed to end up with clumps.

But even if you succeed in getting your salt evenly distributed, the flavor is different. The liquid components may be OK, but anything solid (pasta, meat, vegetables, whatever) will not be penetrated by the salt. So if you salt your dish to the point where the liquid tastes normal, you get bland pieces swimming in an OK sauce or broth. At that point, most people just automatically think that it is still bland, and continue to salt, resulting in oversalted broth/sauce with bland veggies, which in my opinion is even worse.

Third, the salt isn't used only to add taste. A saline solution's chemical properties are quite different from those of pure (or tap) water. Marinading with salt (with or without liquid) changes the texture of steaks (but does so rather slowly). Vegetables cook firmer in salty water, instead of getting mushy. And then there are all the amazing things it does to grains (because it affects both starches and gluten). In short, don't bake a yeast dough without a pinch of salt.

Sadly, all this means that there is no way for both of you to eat what you want/should. My advice is that you should definitely salt the food even for the low-sodium eater at the proper cooking time, you just should use a much smaller amount - even a gram of salt per liter of water can be useful for the chemical changes you want, and shouldn't add too much of a sodium load to a normal sized portion. As for bringing your portion to your own taste, you will have to put up with the worse saltening. Just take care not to oversalt as a reaction, it doesn't really help.


How to get a smooth paste from ground chickpeas?

You cannot make good hummus from canned chickpeas, you should make it from fresh dried beans
The beans need plenty of soaking and rinsing
When cooking, add one tsp of baking soda per cup of beans. Baking soda chemically softens the bean proteins. Never add salt or other flavourings during the bean cooking stage

Traditional hummus is somewhat coarse, but very soft (due to baking soda). It is made with a minimal amount of olive oil, but drizzled with olive oil and a sprinkle of cooked, and still warm chick peas when served
Restaurant hummus is often just over processed junk made in a factory with a commercial grinder (like a peanut butter grinder)
Also, see How should I prepare dried chickpeas? if your chickpeas never go soft


what to do with fish steaks that still have scales on?

Assuming you're cooking the the fish in a sauce, cut the meat away from the skin, liberally (it sounds like you really don't like the scales). Put what remains of the skin in cheese cloth (like a bouquet garni) to get the flavor out of them. The cloth should keep the scales out. You may need to layer the cheesecloth. You can remove it toward the end of cooking.


The book Putting Food By recommends canning pints or half pints (about the range you have) of hot-pack pimentos at 10lbs pressure (240F/116C) for 20 minutes (sorry for the American measurements, it's an American book).  They also recommend putting a small amount of acid in the canning liquid, like 1tsp white vinegar per pint.

By "hot-pack" they mean grilled, skinned, and put in the jar while still warm, with warm liquid.

Added in response to comments:

Per the asker's comment, healthy canning recommends 35 minutes at 10-11lbs pressure.

So I decided to look in the USDA guide, and see what the tie breaker is, and their recommendation is 35 minutes as well.

So I'm not entirely certain whether the Putting Food By recommendation is dated (this is the 1982 edition), or whether the 20min time reflects the addition of a small amount of acid to the canning liquid.


Yeast is a living thing. If your yeast was exposed to conditions that killed or damaged it, most likely extreme temperatures, you will not get the results you expect regardless of the date stamped on the container. On the other hand, just because it's past the date on the jar, the yeast hasn't necessarily kicked the bucket yet.

Related: Does active dry yeast really expire?


Pumpkin mousse looks grainy and slightly watery

No, you cannot turn this mixture into a mousse. You have to eat it as it is - which is probably simply a tasty creamy pudding without the expected mousselike consistency. Even if it is grainy, there is no reason not to eat it that way. Unless you find it utterly impalatable, in which case you have to throw it away. It is normal to expect some failures with such an intricate recipe, especially if you have little previous experience with patisserie.


Using osmotolerant yeast in regular bread

It should be fine. There is no reason it won't grow at lower sugar content, though there is a possibility that it has slightly slower growth under lower sugar levels, due to optimization of the metabolism for the more bio-available sugars.
All the information that has been is saying is that if you have a relatively high sugar content in your bread, then use the "osmotolerant" variety, not that the variety won't grow under conditions outside of those specified.
I seriously doubt that recipe adjustment would be necessary. As I mentioned above, it may have slightly slower growth under low sugar conditions, but this is likely to be minimal and at worst require longer proofing/rising stages.


If it is a french dish (they have other cuisines in Paris, yeah?) then it is likely to be a mix of poached (baby) vegetables, with or without some poached protein (fish or fowl). No fruit. These delicate veg dishes are prolific, hard to cook cos they depend on a carefully crafted stock and best quality veg (& little else, bar the molecular gastronomy nonsense foam). They can be a revelation in taste if done well and expertly, otherwise they look and taste like the remnants of stock-making day, that over boiled sludge in the bottom of your colander.

I doubt this dish has a name, as such. Obviously the menu named it, but in Larousse I'm guessing it would be just the standard poached veg.


Do relish recipes typically include vinegar?

Fruit relishes (including salsas, chutneys, and plain sauces like applesauce) can be made without vinegar.  But they almost always include some extra acid - if not vinegar, then usually citrus juice.

The acidity balances the sweetness of the fruit, and it preserves the color.

So you can make a fruit relish, substitute lemon or lime juice for the vinegar, and use it.  But of course, without a full pickling process, the fruit relish will only have a limited life in the refrigerator.


Melted butter or not for pancake batter?

The butter needs to be melted so it will emulsify with the eggs and milk. This makes a better pancake texture but your pancakes will still be recognizable and tasty if the butter did not fully emulsify.

As Max suggested in a comment, you can make your milk warmer. You can also make your butter warmer- short of burning it- to give yourself more time. You can replace some of the melted butter with oil.

Once the batter is assembled at room temperature there is less risk of the butter separating. Therefore, mixing the wet and dry ingredients before the butter can solidify is useful. In this case the flour would slightly warm the milk.

However you do it, making pancake batter ahead of time is generally a bad idea because the chemical leavening in the batter will activate and be expended. You might get a second lift from double acting baking powder but it still won't be as fluffy.


Any benefit to buy high-quality meat for a mediocre cook?

This is a great question, but not one that can be answered with "yes" or "no".

In some areas, it is known that the professional grade tools and ingredients require much skill to use well and so the general public is better off using consumer grade tools. (Try tasking the average office drone to create a report with Word or QuarkXpress and you'll see what I mean). But there is no such general rule in cooking. And yet, this does not mean that better quality meat will always make better quality food. It depends on the details of each situation.

First, what does "high quality meat" mean? A filet mignon is a prized cut, and costs much more than shank. But even the best cook cannot make a good stew out of filet mignon. So in the first place, you have to know which category of meat is suited for the dish you are making. Only within a given category will better meat produce better results.

Second, "quality" means different things to different people. A cooking beginner usually cannot recognize which meat will produce better results in the given category and goes by factors like price and store reputation to decide which meat must be better quality. This is not necessarily correlated to better taste. So, as a beginner, you can pick meat you believe to be better, but end up with worse results.

The combination of these two points means that you should be aware of the difference between a "better" cut and a higher-quality version of the same cut. A "better" cut is actually a different cut, so it's a substitution that usually won't guarantee a better result. But a higher-quality upgrade of the same cut is likely to make a dish better. So, you need the cooking skill to tell a given piece of meat will be a good substitution for your earlier choice (a higher-quality version) or not (it is simply a better cut). Also, if somebody is trying to sell you a different version, you need to be able to recognize its quality (marbling in steaks, color intensity in pork chops, etc.)

Third, you can certainly find many cases where the more refined dishes, which need rarer, prized cuts, require a lot of skill to pull off well. So, if you decide to buy the "better" meat - as in the filet mignon vs. shank example - and have enough knowledge to match the dish to it, your skill might not be sufficient to pull off the dish for that meat well, while it would have been sufficient to make a good dish of the type for which the cheaper meat was suited.

Fourth, for each dish, the relative influence of skill vs. ingredient quality will be different for the final dish quality. So, it is possible that for going from "horrible" to "kinda edible" you need to get some skill, no matter what meat you use, but the jump from "kinda edible" to "not that bad" requires better meat, not better skill.

It is impossible to list all possible situations, dishes and meat cuts and say for each where the end result quality is skill-limited and where it is ingredient-limited. I am afraid that you have to be an intermediate cook before you can recognize if a mediocre cook can improve his results by cooking a given dish with better ingredients.


Can I make this bread recipe gluten free?

Gluten free bread recipes are hard to get right, and maybe won't function with kneading per hand (there was a question about non-rising gluten free bread yesterday). You are much better off with an existing gluten-free bread recipe. Pick one which you know to be good, and prepare the dough as usual. Follow the recipe which is described here from the "Take the dough and flatten it out a little" sentence on, using your known good gluten-free dough instead of the one described here.

I don't know what would be the best substitute for the soaked wheat, experiment with soaked grains or myabe something else which gives a slight crunch (sunflower seeds, almond pieces - don't soak these).


I am wondering if the origin of this step in the recipe comes from recipes written in India, and have been copied over into western book without asking this questions.

I do know that many times in India, rice is stored in sacks with some kind of insecticide (usually boric acid) applied to it. So there's always a need to wash the rice before it's cooked.. So maybe this step comes from that..


Also known as a "bird's beak", it's used for tournéeing root vegetables (turning them into little footballs) and making fancy, delicate cuts when carving garnishes from fruit or vegetables. More practically, the curved blade is great for peeling round vegetables and fruit. It's a complete pain in the butt to sharpen without a belt grinder (or pro sharpening service with same), but gosh, it looks neat. Congrats on the fun present!


You are fighting a losing battle here. Cocoa powder does not dissolve in water, and it will simply sediment over time. If you are unwilling to do something about viscosity (and I understand that - gums do change flavor), you can only slow the process by using methods which are increasingly difficult to apply at home (basically, creating smaller cocoa powder pieces).

If you are not already doing so, boiling the sauce first will help somewhat. This is the same line of thinking as adding some starch (cornstarch or tapioca were mentioned, doesn't matter which). Cocoa powder itself is mostly starch, so once it is cooked, it will be more puddinglike and will bind water better.

My preferred solution though would be to abandon the recipe and start working with chocolate instead. Chocolate is a sol, consisting of solid particles suspended in fat. Much like an emulsion, only both phases are solid. When you mix it with the fatty emulsion of milk, you achieve a much smoother mixture than the cocoa powder + water combination. It won't guarantee perfect dispersion, but should be better. Unlike the previous suggestion, do not boil or you will lose the advantages of the existing sol/emulsion.


freezing cooked turkey, ham and chicken slices

Generally, freezing meat and thawing before consumption will not affect flavor. There are some precautions you can take when freezing and thawing to ensure that the meat doesn't get damaged (i.e. freezer burnt or overcooked if you thaw under heat). Here is an excerpt from a useful article on the subject.

  When packaging meats for the freezer, the most important thing is to
  protect them from exposure to air. Wrap meats very tightly in either
  plastic wrap or freezer paper, pressing the wrapping right up against
  the surface of the meat. Next, wrap another layer of aluminum foil
  around the meat or seal it inside a zip-top freezer bag.

  Packaged like this, meat can be kept frozen for at least three months.
  After this time, even well-wrapped meats can start to develop freezer
  burn, though I've often cooked meat several months after freezing and
  found it to be perfectly fine.

  The best and safest way to thaw meat is to place the frozen package in
  the refrigerator and let it thaw gradually. Small cuts will thaw this
  way in about 24-hours while larger cuts can take a few days. If you're
  rushed for time, small cuts can also be thawed in a bowl of lukewarm
  water under running water.

For some more tips see the full article: http://www.thekitchn.com/freezer-savvy-the-best-way-to-freeze-and-thaw-meat-177355


Most people who identify as vegan do not eat honey. Some do.

Hopefully when faced with a throat problem, they consume medicine (which typically is not a problem for diabetics).


Can a rice cooker make amounts much smaller than its rating?

As I note in my answer here, I use the exact model you are considering. It is one of the best gadgets I've purchased. It has no problem making any batch down to 1 cup in size. Being able to cook the full 5.5 cups when entertaining is invaluable as well.

I will sometimes cook more than I need for lunch the next day, as well as making fried rice for the following night's dinner.

Bottom line: you won't regret the purchase.


Any downside to pre making marinade and then putting it in the fridge?

No, for most marinades, there should be no reason you cannot make them in advance and refrigerate.  It may even allow some improvements as flavors from any herbs or spices infuse into the liquid.

You just want to practice good food safety, which means putting it in the refrigerator as soon as it is made.


Why does adding sugar/salt causes water to release?

Salting (sugar coating) the surface of the vegetables; causes Osmosis.

Water molecules inside the fruit, will move from lower concentration of solvent (salt/sugar) to a higher concentration medium (outside of the fruit)