Just look for a "white" or "fine white" - many of the chapati flour companies make half a dozen types. Don't expect to find the full range at any of the "middle class" emporiums like Ocado, Sainsbury, etc, you'll have to dig a little deeper than that; but it depends where you live. My local Asda does 2 or 3 varieties, Sainsbury's... none.

Personally, I don't like Chakki flour at all as it makes doughy soft chapatis & I like mine with a bit of dry bite to them.
Basically, the finer & whiter the flour, the more doughy the chapatis, so going for whiter than white flour isn't always a winner, unless it's for health reasons as opposed to flavour. A 'medium' flour is going to make chapatis like your local takeaway makes.

This is a fairly random link rather than an actual recommendation, but just to show the varieties available - Elephant Atta's flour range
btw, I have nothing against East End's food range, I use it a lot - Elephant's just looked easier to navigate.

As for additives - I think you're just going to have to read the back of the pack. I think these days, 'fortification' is pretty much the norm for white flours; wholemeal is less likely to have additives.


How do I get the best possible texture when making vegetable cream soups?

You could always blend before you strain.  I find that when making soup of all kinds that a few minutes with my immersion blender does wonders for the final product.  Not only does it puree all the solids into much smaller chunks, but it also makes sure that all the liquid is a homogeneous whole.

After blending, I also tend to strain just to get out anything that I might have missed.  I use a fine mesh strainer and a spatula to force the liquid through quickly.  I also own an old flour sifter that I have used quite a few times instead of the strainer, but it doesn't offer any real benefits over the other.


How can I get more umami in a veggie burger?

Umami comes from natural glutamates. Two excellent vegan sources of umami are tomato paste and dried shiitake mushrooms (rehydrate then mince). Fresh shiitake aren't nearly so high in glutamates. They are available very inexpensively at Asian groceries.

If you want vegetarian, but not vegan and can find a rennet-free parmesan-style cheese, they are also very high in glutamates.


How does cooking food changes its content of carbohydrates and sugar?

This is a rather general question, and I will try to answer it in a general manner.

First, the total amount of carbohydrates will not change, or maybe there will be a neglible reduction due to things like burning tiny bits of surface carbohydrates to carbon, or cleaning the vegetables.

Second, the ratio of all carbohydrates to everything else can easily change, due to evaporation. So if you start with a vegetable that is 10% carbohydrates and 90% water, you can end up with one that is 30% carbohydrates and 70% water, rounded (the numbers I am using are pretty arbitrary, the real range is very large). It is easy to find out the direction of change yourself (the carbohydrate density will go up if you evaporate water, and down if you add water), but calculating the actual amount can be a pain. You'd have to know the initial density to start with, and then monitor the initial and final weight of the food.

Third, the ratio of sugar to nonsugar carbohydrates can change. It will always go from more complex to less complex carbohydrates - from polysaccharides to oligosaccharides to monosaccharides. So you can sometimes produce conditions under which starch turns into glucose, or sucrose turns into glucose+fructose, although this won't happen every time you cook. I cannot think of any cooking process that will convert sugars in the other direction. The magnitude of that conversion will vary wildly in practice, depending on the very specific chemical conditions in your cooking pot.

Fourth, there is another effect, but it is likely to be very small in magnitude. The browning of food happens during the Maillard reaction, which is a family of reactions between a carbohydrate and an amino acid. While it is best known from meat, where I think it involves mostly glycoproteins from the animal cells themselves, vegetables brown too, and I suppose some carbohydrates from the vegetables "disappear" in this kind of reaction. It is a thing that happens mostly on the surface of roasted food, and in a specific temperature range, so while it contributes a lot to the aroma, I don't think it actually converts much carbohydrates away.


The question you are asking has no technological solution - you cannot put caramel on something wet and preventing from becoming wet. So you are looking at logistical solutions, and you have basically listed them already.

For eating on premises, you keep the custard in the fridge and add the sugar and torch just before serving, as you mentioned. This is so well-suited and common, that I don't think anybody has had the need to develop any alternatives.

For eating later at home, there are two options. One is as you said - you caramelize when selling, and the buyer has to live with the choice between eating it soon or eating it later without a snappy crust. The second is the one used by supermarkets and mentioned in comments - you package coarse dry brown sugar separately, and the customer has the choice between producing a good caramel crust at home (which is time-consuming and not everybody has the needed tools) or eating a custard with sprinkled brown sugar that has not been actually caramelized into a crust.

A variation of the "package the sugar" along option is to package caramel along, either as a whole disc or ground into sugar-sized crystals. It doesn't require the customer to caramelize at home (so the tool and time drawbacks are eliminated), but it is clearly separate from the custard, making it less like real creme brulee.

All two (or three) solutions fall short of the ideal, but as far as I am aware, you can't do better than that. You can just choose which negative is the most acceptable for you and your customers.


Tofu substitute in no bake chocolate cake

This almost sounds like someone converted a classic mousse recipe to use tofu instead of dairy. My suggestion is to simply use any dairy with a consistency similar to your soft tofu, in the same ratio as the tofu. You can use cream cheese, if you are accustomed to the combination with chocolate. If you aren't, you might be unpleasantly surprised - in that case, take a less salty cheese, for example tvorog or ricotta. Fermented products will also work instead of cheese - you can use skyr or drained yogurt, maybe even creme fraiche.


Are there any other gums that work in gluten-free baking besides xanthan and guar?

It's not quite as effective as xanthan gum but I find arrowroot flour works wonders.  You can also try locust bean gum or psyllium husk (soak it in water before mixing so that it can dissolve)

Those are more starchey than the gums and are meant to be mixed with amaranth, rice, quinoa, or other more coarse flours it gives you that same "slimey" start that hold the bubbles as the bread cooks. That's generally gone by the time it's cooked.

When you're using guar gum, try to keep the quantity down to about 1% by weight of the dry ingredients. Also give it time to fully hydrate before adding the rest of the ingredients.  I normally mix mine in dry with the flour and then add milk or water to get things wet and then leave it for a couple minutes before continuing.

If the gum (or even the arrowroot flour) is properly hydrated it will be more effective in baking.  Plus you can use less liquid overall which is good because it's easy to overdo the liquid in GF bread.


How do I keep Glaze for Gingerbread cookies translucent

I believe you can combine 1 part water to 3 parts sugar in a saucepan and heat until the sugar dissolves and the liquid is clear. Allow it to cool to just above room temperature before applying to your cookies. It will harden when cool and be translucent.

Food.com has a recipe and directions here: http://www.food.com/recipe/simple-cookie-glaze-345260


Quality control of food

A good chef should be able to explain what his/her methods are for controlling food quality and determining whether the price is appropriate for the quality delivered.

Inventory control

A good chef should have an understanding of the inventory required to serve the expected guests. He/she should be able to talk about methods how to make sure that you don't run out of items you need or throw too much food away.

Menu price

A good chef should be able to calculate the price for a menu.

Composition

A good chef has a thorough understanding that the eye is as important as the tongue, when serving meals.

Food safety
A good chef knows that food safety comes before profit. You could try this with a trick question like:"You have made the last four Kobe beef steaks for four guests, but the waiter dropped the plates just before leaving the kitchen. How do you save the situation?"


Can soft-boiled eggs be reboiled and turned into hard-boiled eggs?

In terms of food safety, as long as the egg would have been safe to eat as it is (that is, it still is in its unbroken shell, has been cooled rapidly after cooking and then refrigerated), it is safe to recook.

In terms of quality, I am not sure that you will get a very palatable result.  You are likely to end up with overcooked and rubbery whites at the very least.


why does my non dairy creamer not dissolve in coffee?

It depends on the contents of the coffee and the creamer and how they react to each other. For example some creamers are just corn syrup solids mixed with emulsifiers, and they usually mix less effectively if the coffee isn't hot enough.

Or, as you mentioned, if the problem is with the brand of the coffee, then it's possible that the coffee that's giving you trouble contains more oil than the other.

If you've soaked oily dishes in detergent, sometimes if there's enough oil, once the water cools down, there will be bits of solid oil floating on the surface. It's basically the same with your coffee. The warmer the temperature and the less oil, makes a better mix.

That said, I prefer using milk if you can. If you're lactose intolerant or allergic to milk fats, I'd suggest substitutes like soy, rice, or almond milks. The closest I've found is half almond, half coconut milk. Or better still, just drink it black.


Split pea soup won't soften. Any way to soften the peas without burning?

Starting with more water than you think you need, keeping the lid on for a bit and then stirring a lot while it reduces to the desired consistency should be all you need to do. Don't go far from it once it starts to thicken because it will need too much stirring.

You can cook split peas in a slow cooker, but I haven't found the softening very reliable. A fast boil before you start might help.


A well-developed sourdough should be able to generate a micro climate within his jar that supresses other growth like mold. This holds especially true for "old", well-established strains. We (1) use a sourdough strain that's been cultivated for at least 20 years. (After that, history becomes a bit murky...)

Young sourdough is the most susceptible to contamination and needs some time to develop a good souring/ leavening ratio. During the first weeks or even months, the baking properties of a sourdough might change quite a bit. So while a sourdough ist "working" after a few days, older lines are preferrable - the various yeasts will adapt to your conditions and develop a stable "society" (for lack of a better word).

As far as your mold problem is concerned, I'd just start over. You will have lost just a few days and your next batch will probably be fine. It's possible that in your moldy batch some "weaker" strains of yeasts grew that couldn't handle other micro-organisms. This happens sometimes. For old strains, I'd be tempted to try a "rescue mission" as described in the other post, but as the outcome is unclear, I wouldn't bother with a new batch. Just follow the instructions carefully, work with clean utensils and perhaps check your water -if it's heavily chlorinated you might be better off with bottled, at least in the beginning.

(1) "We" are a group of bakers that regularly bake and sell artisanal bread for charity.


How do I make my baking powder biscuit dough stick together?

If its dry adding some kinda liquid would help. Probably just needs a little more. Also helps to see the recipe. It probably said x amount of cups of flour it makes a difference if it was sifted before vers straight out of the bag. Better to go by weight instead of volume.


Can silicone moulds be used for making cupcakes in electric tandoor

SilPat, a brand of silicone baking pads, is certified to 480°F. I don’t know about “electric” tandoors, but traditional tandoors, even the DIY kind, generally are much hotter than this.

So, If your tandoor can’t cook at considerably reduced temperatures, your silicone cupcake molds will not be effective. I don’t think your cupcakes would stand that kind of heat either, as a commenter already pointed out!y


The Russian Wikipedia article on Beef has several diagrams - a current one in the main section apparently originally derived from the German wikipedia, and two others from older Russian sources.

I was also able to find another site with another diagram, and translations of some of the cuts into English, which is helpful because the names are difficult to translate to similar English cuts via Google Translate, which simply gives anatomical terms for many of them.

Here is an article from the Moscow Times discussing the subject, largely from the perspective of someone who only knows the American name for the cut they are looking for.


What makes a pasta shape pair with a sauce?

Fats adhere to broad or flat areas nicely (fettucini, linguine) and press the creamier sauces against more tongue surface to enhance/emphasize their smoothness
Pooling sauces needs nested, medium pasta (round or flat) that help to punctuate the sharper and more diverse flavors of a smooth, acidic by alternating between pasta and sauce
Angel hair and other fine pasta do well with a chunky sauce as it is effective with pick up but doesn't obstruct the sauce's texture once you get it in your mouth

My basis for this is (1) ease and volume of transport, plate to mouth of sauce; as well as (2) how the pasta interacts with the sauce to create mouth feel and churn of sauce against tongue. As for gnocchi and other variously shaped pasta; if it has a cavity, it should have fats, if it has a textured surface acidic sauces will cling nicely.

Obviously, I would shy away from pretending any of these were definitive answers, they are reasoned and seasoned, based on sauce/pasta dynamics and experience preparing them.

This book has a listing of specific pairings of sauces to pasta.
This book, upon which Geometry was based, also has a listing of
sauces with additional options.

I don't seem to be able to find any good, objective maxims for when to use what; but, considering the variety of pastas and the prolific diversity of sauces (i.e. a different ragu for every house), it seems only appropriate that every person should have an opinion on why a particular sauce works with a particular pasta.


Best way to preserve choco-chip cookies: food saver?

First, I have to say that I very rarely have to store cookies for more than a few days...

However, if it must be done, then I find that they keep well for 7-10 days (depending on the recipe) in an airtight container on the counter. I've never tried vacuum sealing the container. I think that that would lead to explosive cookie crumbles when you tried to open it.

If you simply want fresh cookies over a long period of time, the best way in my opinion is to make the dough, roll into balls, and freeze the balls. They will last for 2-3 months in the fridge, and you can bake as many or as few as you like straight from frozen (add an extra minute to the baking time). There will be freshly baked cookies in the amount of time it takes you to make the coffee.


After Deglaze the pan with the red wine and cook on high heat for 1 minute, scraping the bottom of the pan. but prior to adding the beef stock, reduce the wine to almost a syrup. Most of the alcohol will be driven off, along with most of the water. When the, relatively large volume of beef stock is added, the concentration of alcohol will be greatly reduced. You may need to add additional liquid to make up for the missing wine and You may need to adjust how the garlic is handled, so to not over cook at high heat.

Edited to remove wrong chemistry.


What is the advantage of using buttermilk in baking?

Historically, milk was accumulated in the churn until there was enough to be worth making butter. The milk would, of course, ferment. Both the butter and the watery buttermilk took the sour, fermented flavor.

Modern buttermilk is different. It is low fat milk that has been cultured and fermented. It is thicker and creamier but has a similar soured flavor. (I've been told. I've never tasted historically fermented buttermilk.)

Therefore, historical recipes are not going to be the same as modern recipes that call for buttermilk.

The "buttermilk" left in your homemade butter would not have fermented and would not be similar to historical or modern buttermilk. It does have a good amount of sugar and protein, and of course water, that would affect your recipe.

In modern recipes, buttermilk is used to lower the ph, add a tangy flavor and a creamier texture than milk. The added fat is not usually a factor. Creamy buttermilk can be made with skim milk.

As dlb pointed out in a comment, the creaminess and acid allows chemically risen baked goods to be fluffier with the same liquid and fat content as regular milk.


Differences between cooking a whole duck vs chicken or turkey?

With chicken and turkey, the most important "trick" to cooking it is to make sure the dark meat gets done before the white meat dries out, and to make sure the skin crisps up somewhat.

Duck is all dark meat, and has a thick layer of fat that must be rendered out. There is not a lot of danger in drying out the breast meat like with a chicken.

Like Martha said, it's best to make a few shallow cuts in the skin over the breast (don't go all the way through to the meat) to help the fat render out. A simple (western) roasted bird would be cooked at 350°F for about 1 hour 45 min, with the oven turned up to 500°F for another 15 minutes to crisp up the skin. There is a LOT of fat rendered out, so it's best to roast in a sturdy roasting pan, on a rack (so it doesn't sit in the fat), and drain the fat about an hour into cooking (save the fat, though; it's delicious).

Personally, I think duck is easier to cook, but it's definitely different from roasting a chicken.


How to get more flavor out of dried herbs?

Dry herbs are slower to release their flavors than fresh herbs; they will need extra cooking time to impart their full flavors, so add them to the dish sooner.  Since they are less delicate and need the moisture, you may also want to add them along with a liquid, to help extract out the flavors. Crushing the larger-leaf herbs up a bit may also help. Use less dried herb than you would with fresh, because they are more concentrated.

Although these will help, the sad truth is that even the best-dried herbs will not have the subtle flavors of fresher ones.

Edit: One other technique you might use (if there's minimal cooking of other ingredients) is to soak them in oil for a long time to extract flavors.  I would suggest an overnight soak in olive oil.  You can get more flavor out if you heat the olive oil before letting it sit to soak; something like 50C/125F is a reasonable temperature to dissolve more flavor compounds, without damaging the more delicate ones.


This won't work, and it isn't about the clogging - you just won't be able to spray.
First, you cannot refill an aerosol bottle at home, so you are limited to using pump spray bottles. The pump spray bottles you can buy are meant for water and water-based liquids. If you fill a normal pump spray bottle with cooking oil and spray, what you get is a single streak of oil, not a mist of droplets.
Second, there is a reason why the industrial spray uses lecithine and other emulsifiers. Without those, your oil will not be sprayed-on, it will run together into a few large droplets, leaving most of your pan oil-free. So, even if you find a spray bottle that works with oil, you still won't have an oil-coated pan.
Third, these sprays are meant for baking. If you give your pan a small spritz of oil only, this is likely not going to be enough oil for an omelette. So you will have to use as much oil as when applying standard oiling techniques anyway.
In the end, the bottle would not be really worth it if it worked, and chances are you won't even get it to work. So, I would call the idea a dead end.


What are the consequences of infusing a tea bag longer than recommended?

The tea will be stronger than you'd like if you steep it for too long. Over-steeping sometimes gives a bitter flavor as well. (I am guilty of frequently over-steeping as I have the attention span of a goldfish. Sometimes I remember to set a timer, sometimes not.)


How do we escape the cycle of bad college eating?

I'm in the same situation as you are, I'm a college student on a budget. What you need to do is convince yourself that it's better to cook your own food. I accomplish this by tracking how much I spend on food at the grocery store each week, and comparing it to buying fast food. I've been doing this since Summer of 2010 and trust me, cooking yourself is a lot cheaper. Per day, I spend about the same that I would on one meal (pizza, whatever), only that includes breakfast, dinner, snacks, etc. If you track it yourself, you will quickly find it's more expensive to eat out, although it is convenient.

I also make a list of meals I would like for the week (I shop a week at a time), and use this list when purchasing and stick to it. You'll find that when you follow recipes, you can make a lot of substitutions for what you have on hand instead of having to buy another ingredient.

To avoid losing ingredients, just stick them in the freezer! Meat, vegetables, whatever you're buying, most of it can be frozen. And frozen stuff lasts for weeks (minimum). Leftovers can be frozen too. When whole chickens are on sale for example, I buy them up (2-3 at a time) and freeze them until needed.

The worst thing I find is (as you've probably seen) the time commitment. It takes time, but you if you cook more you get better at it.

I also find that the less "processed" food is, the cheaper it is. For example, buy whole chicken or split chicken breasts instead of boneless/skinless/etc. and cut it up yourself. Look for the "reduced price" meats when their sell-by date is close to expiring, and freeze them. They are fine. Buy potatoes, canned vegetables, and avoid meals that come in a box! They seem cheap but they are more expensive than what you can do yourself.

... and finally, the real motivation (for me at least) is that I got sick of the options available around campus. If you make your own food, you're not limited by a menu and eventually it will taste better!


Does using egg+yolk in a chocolate chip cookie recipe make a big difference?

The main reason that you'll see recipes use a specific part of the egg is that the whites and yolks have a very different composition.  The whites contain a large number of structural proteins (which is why they can be whipped into stable foams) while the yolks contain most of the fats in the egg. Fats and proteins play very different roles in baking.

So, if you see a recipe that uses a whole egg plus an additional yolk, the yolk is there to add fats without adding the additional proteins that the white would bring to the party. This affects the structure of the batter and the texture/flavor of the finished product. Generally the extra fat will contribute extra softness and richness, from its composition and of course extra moisture. Here's a good question with related information.

In regards to commercial production, I'd be really doubtful that large commercial producers are using anything like whole eggs. Based on scale alone, they're more likely to be using pre-separated eggs from a supplier, or perhaps some kind of horrifying egg substitute. Not to mention all sorts of stabilizers, emulsifiers, preservatives, and so on that all perform functions similar or complementary to the chemical action of the egg.

As for extra whites, there's any number of uses for those. Powdered egg white is a surprisingly common food additive because of its thickening and emulsifying properties, and it's possible to find packaged, pre-separated egg whites in cartons. The same producers that make these are likely supplying the commercial baking operations too. Don't go imagining that the Chips Ahoy factory is full of a bunch of enterprising bakers cracking and separating eggs all day long, casually chucking out extra whites. If there's waste, it's further up the supply chain, and most likely the supplier is finding something to do with those extra whites.


Help with hand tossed pizza dough (like domino's)

the problem is that a dough made to last 6 days of refrigerated fermentation should be different that one made to be baked after 24 or 48 hours.

If you use a stronger flour (W=350) your dough will be great after 5-6 days, but not perfect before; to have a great dough after 24 hours you should use a medium flour.

If your flour does not indicate the W value (that can roughly be considered proportional to the protein level) try adding a bit (1/3) of Manitoba Flour to your next dough (but consider that it will be less good the first day)


Are blenders and food processors usually rated in terms of average wattage or peak wattage?

I'm no electrician, but as Amps = Watts/Volts they had better be telling you the peak load, or you risk blowing fuses.
1500W on 240v = 6.25A.
1500W on 120v = 12.5A
This isn't like cheap hi-fi where they tell you the peak figure to make you think it's going to be louder ;)


How to predict what the final result of a recipe will weigh?

Your end result if you follow that recipe would weigh approximately 22 ounces, or 1 pound 6 ounces, or 1.375 pounds. (There are 16 ounces in a pound. Fluid ounce and ounce as a unit of weight are not exactly the same thing, but pretty darn close considering the ingredients you are working with; there are 8 fluid ounces in an American "cup", a "fluid ounce" of water weighs one ounce)

In the future if you have questions like this with other ingredients (particularly how much does a volumetric measurement [1 cup, or 1 Tablespoon] of an ingredient weigh), you might find this chart helpful: Master Weight Chart

Maybe this will help too: To make 1 pound of your recipe you would need 330g of Cream Cheese, 82g of Sour Cream and 41g of Whipping Cream.


Sauteing onions to the point of transparency - what is ideal?

Assuming that you want to end up with light onions and not caramelized onions:

You always want the onions to be cooked through enough to have lost the sharp flavor and hard texture, just as Michael mentioned.

In some recipes, you will prepare them to the desired stage, then finish the recipe with the other ingredients. This is frequently done in stir-frys.

But sometimes, you know that the onions are just the start of a complex recipe, and will continue to be cooked for a long time. This is especially a problem with stews and soups, where letting the onions simmer can render them too soft, somewhat jellyfish-like. Then it is better to fry enough to change the aroma through the dry heat and fat reactions (I don't know which ones they are, but they don't occur when you are boiling an onion in liquid), but stop a bit before it has lost its firmness. Then you continue cooking the soup, and your onions end up firmer than if you had cooked them through at the beginning.

And a pedantic notice: you are probably not sauteeing the onions, and if you are, you should stop doing it. Sauteeing means to use very high heat and keep the food in constant movement by shaking the pan. The proper way to turn onions translucent is to put an even layer of them above melted butter, and wait for them to get ready, on medium heat. If the layer is thick, wait until the bottom ones are quite close to being done before mixing thoroughly once and then waiting again for the bottom ones. Repeat until all onions in the pan are translucent. They benefit from slow and even heating, while sauteeing is a treatment intended for highly heated surfaces but keeping the core colder.


When making yogurt, why doesn't bad bacteria grow as well?

The initial heating of the milk, besides denaturing proteins to improve the texture, also pasteurizes the milk.

The culture needs to be added in a high enough concentration to crowd out harmful bacteria that might exist.

That said, if your tools or containers are dirty or if your starter is dead, or you don't add enough starter, your yogurt can grow accidental bacteria and go off.

Note
As Bob1 commented, this applies to the first few hours of fermentation before the milk has become acidic enough to inhibit other microbes.


I removed some of the black metallic covering of my pan, is it still safe to use?

Looking at the close-up, I'd say that the 'black stain' is where the actual non-stick Teflon coating has already been scratched off.
The bare metal is where you finished the job & also removed the substrate, which was probably used to get the Teflon to stick to the aluminium.

I think you've reached the point where it's simpler to just throw it in the recycle & buy a new one.
Treat it more gently next time - never use metal utensils or scourers on Teflon. Non-Stick tends to only be good for a couple of years at best, so you need to weigh up how much you're willing to spend on one… every couple of years.


Picking through dried beans - many discoloured ones - moldy?

The beans in your photo simply look old and/or low-quality (the farmer didn't pick out the bruised & marked ones).  They should cook fine, but they might not turn out as well as you'd like.  If you have another bag of beans you can use that's better quality, and time, I'd swap it in.  Or you could just pick out the discolored ones.

If you want to be really cautious, you could taste one of the discolored beans.  If it's actually moldy, you'll be able to taste it in the soaked, raw state; it will have a musty or cheesy flavor.


How to prepare baby lima beans for this paella recipe?

This really isn't a good substitution. Think of the difference between fresh peas and dried split peas - they are two completely different products. But if you are really set on doing this, simply soak and cook the dried limas like you would any other dried bean, then add the fully cooked lima at the same stage that that recipe calls for the fresh beans.


What does North American mixed dried fruit contain?

From a Google search, I found several brands of mixed dry fruits available in the US. Some do contain raisins and/or currants, but not most. Typically, they contain apricots, apples, peaches, plums, pears and sometimes nectarines. Like This


Using Frozen Fries as a Component: How to Dress Them Up?

I always find that frozen fries get much crisper if you heat the baking sheet before you put the fries on it.

Personally I just like to season my fries with salt (I try and use a decent sea or rock salt rather than the cheap table stuff as it does make a big difference), but you could also sprinkle other spices and seasonings onto the fries before you bake them to make them taste a bit more exciting. Paprika, cayenne or garlic salt would all work nicely.


What sauce / spices can make a tofu steak taste like a beef steak

I don't know anything about cooking tofu, so this is purely addressing the beef flavor part. If you want to make something bland taste more like beef, one the largest issues is going to be adding umami flavor. It is present to some degrees in meats, cheeses, mushrooms, soy sauce, and tomatoes. I'd start with a sauce containing several of these items, and then add some complementary flavors (peppers, citrus, sugar, etc).


That recipe actually says there are two ways you can prepare this:

  There are two ways to do this: throw just about everything in a pot of
  water and simmer, then add the milk, tea and sweetener and brew for a
  few minutes; or, let the spices soak overnight in the water then
  simmer in the morning with your tea leaves and milk.

(emphasis mine)

Have you tried the latter? That way you still only have to heat things up once.

I'd be hesitant to boil milk with spices and then store it cold, reheating again. If you're using dairy milk, that is. If you're using anything other than non-fat (skim) milk, you'll get a "skin" on the top of the milk when you're boiling it - that's one of the classic signs of masala chai for me. But anyway, it becomes substantially less appetizing if it has time to cool into globules and is then reheated again. I'm not sure what problems, if any, you'd encounter using non-dairy milk like almond or soy.

You could dump the pre-ground spices into your brewed tea with milk and sugar, but the flavor profile will be a little different. Boiling the spices with the milk and tea gives everything time to meld nicely and provide a really smooth flavor blend. But I don't see any especially compelling reason that you couldn't do it.

I would like to point out, though, that boiling enough water for a travel mug's worth of tea doesn't take any more time to do on the stove than it does in my electric kettle. Adding milk shouldn't make too much difference; I'm willing to bet that after you get familiar with the routine, you can follow this recipe and still have it take 5-6 minutes. :)

Purists will insist that the spices must be boiled with the water, but those are the same people who would scoff at you adding cold milk to your tea in the first place. There's no reason why you can't, other than it might cool down the rest of your tea.


Why does meat in the crockpot always end up dry?

Cooking anything really lean for a long time can result in super dry meat.  Chicken breasts have little fat and little connective issue.  The same goes for a lean beef roast.  You can do chicken breasts in a crock pot - just not all day, more like a few hours on low.

Try something with more fat like a thigh (or any dark meat) or a beef chuck (shoulder) roast and you should have more luck.


Does store-bought Kombucha spoil? If so, how can I tell?

When they say "probiotic", what they mean is that there are microbe cultures present in the kombucha.  It's really nothing more than a sweetened tea which has been fermented by a symbiotic mix of yeast and bacteria.  The odor and distinctive flavor is the result of a low alcohol content and acetic acid (the same acid found in vinegar) produced by the fermentation process.

While these cultures do tend to edge out other bacteria that would spoil the drink and potentially cause illness, it can eventually go bad like anything else.  More to the point, because the cultures are still alive, they'll continue the fermentation process as long as they can, especially once you open the container and start introducing oxygen.  This can throw off the balance of the culture, but it can also just make the kombucha unpleasantly acidic.  Once it gets to that point, it might still be effective from a probiotic stance, but the acid could have an adverse effect on your digestion.

If you keep it sealed and refrigerated, it'll last a couple weeks, but a week or so is probably the effective maximum when you're opening the container frequently. You'll want to stick to purchasing an amount that you can drink within a week or so, but don't worry overmuch if it has a slightly vinegary tang and odor.


Concern over whether roast chicken is safe

The only way to know if your chicken is safe to eat is to measure its temperature.  You should check the breast (165F/74C) and the thigh (can go higher than breast), ensuring your are measuring at the center and not touching bone.  Stuffing is usually not a good idea, because it increases the cooking time, and will likely result in overcooked white meat or under cooked items in the cavity.  Invest in a good thermometer and learn how to use it correctly, you will feel more comfortable and produce better meals.


What kind of bread crumbs is being used here? (picture and video)

I would be very surprised if he bought ready-made bread crumbs.

What would be normal in this part of the world (and indeed, what it looks like in the video) is to just get a normal white loaf (ie. sliced bread for making sandwiches) and whizz it in a food processor. This way also allows you to get whatever size crumb you desire.


I've been using an iPad as others have suggested. Option 1 is to vecro it to a cabinet or the fridge etc. where it is not in danger of getting caught in a spill. You can navigate just fine with a nuckle or the back of your wrist if your hands are a mess.

Option 2 is put it in a gallon zipper bag. I recommend the 'storage' type over the freezer type as the plastic is thinner and won't interfere with the screen. If you are going to be using it for something with audio it won't sound good, but if you have something with airplay (I use a in the kitchen you can shift the audio over there, which is a good idea anyway as the volume level of an iPad really can't compete with kitchen noise.

I'm considering putting in a permanently mounted 50" LCD screen when I remodel. If so it will be connected to a computer in the basement under the kitchen, and have a touchscreen overlay added to it. The overlay uses light beam interruption and senses 'touch' without you really having to make contact with the screen. This is probably more than most people want to mess with though.


Three main factors you need to think about is the water ratio, method of cooking and portion size.

When cooking Japanese rice(short glutinous grains) the optimal ratio is about 1:1 of water and grain. Normally when cooking smaller portions you add additional water to compensate for the water that evaporates and turns to steam while you cook so in most recipes you will see recipes asking for 1 cup and a couple extra tbsp of water for each cup of rice.

However you are cooking a very large numbers of servings so the evaporation will be negligible. You can stick with 1:1 ratio.
To cook the rice you can use either a large stock pot on the stove top or put it into a large pan and bake in the oven.

For the first method, you need a really thick stock pot(a thicker pot results in better heat distribution which results in less burnt bits at the bottom). I would recommend doing 30 servings at a time. Measure out the rice and water and bring to a boil. Then turn the flames down really low and simmer with the lid on for 30-45 minutes. Then turn off the heat and let it sit with the lid on for at least 15 minutes.

To make it in the oven, measure 30 servings of rice and water in a large oven safe pan and bake at 325F for around 30-45 minutes. Turn the oven light on and check if all the water have been absorbed into the rice. Using this method I would increase the amount of water to about 1:1.1 of rice to water.
Rice will generally double in volume when cooked compared to its uncooked version. If you are making 60 1/2cup servings of rice you would need 15 cups of uncooked rice. Or if you are going with 3/4 cups per person, you would need 22.5 cups of uncooked rice. 6 kilo of uncooked rice is around 25 cups so your estimation was pretty close to the mark. I would cook all 6 kilo of rice. Its better to have a bit extra than to not have enough.


Why do my stored cashews smell like fish?

I believe the fat in your cashews is becoming rancid. That would most likely be caused by oxidation. Exposure to air is the chief culprit. However, exposure to light or heat could also accelerate this.

I'd wager you got a jar of nuts that wasn't quite sealed. Have you had this problem before with other jars of these nuts? 1-2 weeks is an abnormally short period of time for this problem to occur in a sealed container.

It's also possible that the nuts are old. Have you checked the "best by" date?

Freezing does not stop oxidation. It would ensure a relatively cool and dark storage place for them, though.

The only way to stop oxidation is to prevent air from touching the food.

Equipped with a new jar with a tight seal and a cool, dark storage place... I think you'll do just fine in subsequent cashew ventures.


you aren't letting it rest long enough....When I used to ruin (run, i meant run, but ruin is just too funny so I am leaving it there) a pizza restaurant, if you forgot to prep the dough the night before and allowed the dough to rest in the refer over night, the dough would be very stiff and springy....

In your case, without really knowing your recipes and so this is a stab in the dark, you probably just need to let the dough rest at room temp for 30 minutes.


How to recover cast iron skillet with melted fiber on it

First, you should never scrub cast iron with a brillo pad, as the steel in the brillo is harder than the cast iron, and can not only strip off the seasoning but scratch up the iron itself.  The same would be true with sandpaper or a dremel.

Instead, you should plan to completely strip and reseason the pan, using lye or oven cleaner (scroll down a couple pages in that article).

If it is only the handle that is a mess, use the oven cleaner method to just strip the handle (protecting the rest of the pan with a plastic bag), then continue the seasoning process.  The handle will end up with fewer layers of seasoning than the rest of the pan, but that's fine, it's just the handle and not a cooking surface.

Alternately, if you can heat the pan in a well-ventilated area (an outdoor grill, for example), you may be able to simply burn off the fibers, depending on what they are made of (if they have a silicone or metallic coating, probably not).  In this case, just heating the pan to more than 500F/250C for a couple hours may take care of the problem, and can even be part of the seasoning process.

Finally, if you plan to handle the hot pan during seasoning again, get some welding gloves.


In any food safety situation you really must ultimately ask yourself 3 questions to determine relative safety:

How High of a temperature am I sure I achieved?

How long did I hold this temperature?

How well sealed is the container?

If you are pressure canning, there are reasonably good chances you kept VERY high pressure and temperature. As for time, I cannot say.

For years my grandparents, my parents and myself have canned vegetables, soups, stocks, etc. and only rarely did we have errors because of some content of food. Most of our spoilage came from broken seals.

If you're confident in your canning technique, I see no reason why some egg white would hurt your stock. It's an animal protein just like any other.


You are not the first to wonder about that and yes, there are “color wheels” approaches, two books for example are

The Science of Spice: Understand Flavour Connections and Revolutionize your Cooking by Dr. Stuart Farrimond
The Flavour Thesaurus by Niki Segnit

Not necessarily an endorsement of these specific books (there are more with a similar concept, some discussing spices, other flavors in general), but those two should get you started in the right direction - or at least give you an idea.


What can I use as a replacement for ricotta or cottage cheese in a lasagna?

I've never used ricotta or any soft cheese on my lasagne - I wonder if it is an Italian American convention. I use bechamel sauce, mozarella and parmesan, and it works very well.


New bread maker asks: how to make a bread loaf stay 'firm and solid' without a loaf pan?

You are spot-on: Whole-grain recipes often use more water and tend to "flow", so using a loaf pan is typically the way to go. Loaf pans alow for a "wetter" dough.

It is absolutely possible to bake a free-form whole-wheat loaf, but it needs experience with kneading, resting time and shaping to balance the water content and comparatively low gluten. Also, for the final rise you had better not rest it on the counter, but in a floured basket (in a pinch, a bowl will do) to avoid the "flattening" effect you noticed. Bake in a very hot, well-preheated oven on a hot pizza stone or in a hot dutch oven to encourage proper crust formation and a good oven spring in a humid environment. (Unless you are going for the solid "Pumpernickel" type, but that would be in a loaf pan anyway.)

So find another recipe (or experiment yourself if you have the experience) and you are good to go. I have successfully worked with high water content (up to 80%), but always with a poolish/pre-fermentation with a long slow rise to "soften" the whole-wheat and get the enzymes going. Doing a few rounds of stretch-and-fold during the first rise helps to align and strengthen the gluten structures (and a tablespoon or two of additional gluten ("vital wheat gluten") is a good trick up your baker's sleeve as well...). Sourdough is optional if you are baking wheat-only, but if you use rye, you should definitively look into that subject as well.

If your main goal isn't a whole-grain loaf, use a classic "Artisan bread"-type recipe, and start exchanging some of the white bread flour with equal parts of whole wheat flour (and - optionally - add some gluten). Find your personal ratio where the result satisfies you. For 20-30% whole-wheat you won't notice much of a difference, with 50% your loaf will get denser and possibly need some "tweaking", e.g. a splash of extra water. The "long-cold-rise-with-very-little-yeast"-types are the most flexible in my experience.

(The oil isn't a problem.)


Sealed package submerged in water in the fridge, still safe to eat?

I know the mantra here is "when in doubt, throw it out", and we know you are in doubt, otherwise you wouldn't be asking the question...but, nevertheless:

The speculation, "something in water may not get as cold as if it wasn't" isn't true. Something in cold water will come to the same temperature as the water, just like it does in cold air, and probably faster than in air.

I don't quite get how that water got into the bottom drawer of your fridge, but if the water was at refrigerator temperature when it came into contact with the bacon and hot dog packages, and if they truly are sealed so that the meat isn't touching the water directly, then they shouldn't be harmed by having the outside of their packaging touched by cold water.


Microwaves don't toast.

The pass high energy microwaves through food. These waves struggle to penetrate high density materials, causing them to heat. It's (mostly) the water within the microwaved food that is heated up, and that cooks (or defrosts) your stuff.

Toasting is an external application of usually radiated (but conducted will do) dry heat.

You might be able to heat the oil within the peanuts to the point where they fry... It'd probably work on multiple levels before turning into a smokey mess or combusting. But even then, frying really isn't the same thing as toasting them.

You want a dry frying pan on a hob, or a grill.


How to increase batch size of dough starter bread?

You can safely double all the ingredients, including the yeast. (See this)

If you're worried about the wet part of the starter having access to the dry flour and yeast, you could try shaping the wet starter to give it more surface area, use a bigger bowl, or simply make two separate bowls of this and combine them later.


What will happen to my cake if I don't cream the butter enough?

The idea of creaming is definitely to incorporate some air into the fat-sugar mixture, which should give the final product a lighter texture. So perhaps your cake was a little heavier than it was supposed to be. Good creaming also helps distribute the fat well.

But maybe you managed to mix some more air in later in the recipe - certainly I imagine you could do better beating the batter with a stand mixer than I can by hand! And with a stand mixer I'm sure it was all mixed fine, too. So if the cakes weren't too heavy for you, it's not anything to worry about.


I note that you say you ‘moved out west’; I wonder if you have moved from a low to a high altitude location?

The USDA has some helpful information

  Most of the western United States (Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, Nevada, Oregon, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming) are wholly or partly at high altitude.

Although many baking sites classify ‘high altitude’ as being over 3000 feet, the USDA site suggests that differences may be experienced with baking anywhere over 2000 feet.

What you describe for cakes, cookies and pastry is what many sites suggest is likely, cakes either crumbling apart after an extended baking time or failing to set at all.  Low air pressure means liquids boil and evaporate at a lower temperature

  Quicker evaporation also has several ramifications. It makes baked goods more prone to sticking. And sugar becomes more concentrated. Some cakes won't set. Or by the time they do set, they've become dry and crumbly.

However your description of bread matches less well, do you find the dough just never rises or might it be a case of it overproving and collapsing?

Many sites offer advice and recipe adjustments for baking at altitude, including King Arthur Flour and AllRecipes.


What happens when you reduce stock all the way?

If you reduce filtered broth all the way, you get portable soup. It dries down into a solid that looks a bit like leather. Because of the gelatin from the bones, portable soup is bendy and flexible. It was used in the 18th century as a portable food item, eg by soldiers and people traveling through the American wilderness. There's an excellent video by historical reinactor J. Townsend: Easiest Way to Make Portable Soup. I summarized the method below.
 (images is from the same video)

Put about 5 pounds of bone-in meat in a slow cooker and cover it with water; don't add any seasonings. Cook until falling-off-the-bone tender. For beef, that's about 8-10 hours on low. Townsend recommends beef shank, neck or brisket, but says poultry will also work. Choose a cut with lots of collagen, so you end up with plenty of gelatin in the broth.
Remove the meat and bones; you can use the meat for another purpose. Let the broth cool until the fat solidifies on the top. Skim off the fat. Strain the remaining broth through a cloth. Now you have clarified broth.
Rinse out the slow cooker and put the clarified broth back in it. Turn the slow cooker on low and let it cook for 18-24 hours with the lid off, until it's reduced to a "medium brow, gluey substance." (Yum!) Don't overcook it, or it will burn and ruin the flavor. You'll probably want to time your cooking so that the end of the 18 hours happens in the morning, so you can spend all day checking on it and don't have to stay up all night waiting for it to finish.
Turn off the slow cooker and let it cool. Remove the portable soup from the crock. At this point, it's still pretty wobbly and gelatinous, like Jello cubes. Put it on a cloth or cooling rack to finish drying. The final drying has to be done with just air, without heat. You can use a food dehydrator on a "no heat" setting, or put the rack in front of a fan, or just let it air dry for a week or so, flipping it at least once a day.
Once the portable soup is dried to the texture of leather (solid, but still somewhat flexible), cut it into convenient portions. Store them wrapped in brown paper or cloth. They will continue to dry and harden over time.

You can also make portable soup on the stove or over a fire, but apparently it's really difficult to do without burning. The slow cooker provides a much lower heat, so it's less likely to burn. You can actually speed up step 3 by starting on a higher heat - either simmering on the stove or using the slow cooker on high. The final stage of cooking should be done on low to minimize the chance of burning. Have a look at Townsends' follow up video, Troubleshooting Portable Soup.
To use the portable soup, rehydrate it in hot water and use it as you would broth.


What is the best way to douse a charcoal grill?

Add some coals over the hot ones and/or reduce airflow some other way (many grills have slits or vents to control airflow, play with those, close them partially).

Both should reduce heat output (adding coals of course will mean the grill will burn for longer and will eventually heat up again).

I'd not throw water or other liquids on it. Only makes a mess :)


Should I have more than one dishwashing soap?

Aluminum cleaners typically contain mild/organic acids and sometimes also contain abrasives, to help remove oxidation. The black color may very well be aluminum oxide which is a cleaning abrasive (a sensible choice for an aluminum pan cleaner). A paste is also sensible for aluminum pots because these pots require a rigorous scrubbing, compared with ceramic, teflon, and steel dishware.

However, most other cleaners are neutral or basic; and other common cleaning abrasives like silicon dioxide are white. Some cleaners contain oxidizers (like peroxides) and others contain reducing agents.

Dish detergent in the USA is generally made for removing/dissolving grease. We tend to use aluminum more for disposable aluminum-foil pans, and opt for stainless steel and/or other cookware materials, because other materials are simply better quality and require less scrubbing, and/or simply diswasher-safe (unlike aluminum which tends to become blackened by the oxidizing cleaners found in dishwasher soap).


Your packages of pectin, regardless of brand, has instructions on how to rescue failed jellies and jams. It's been satisfactory for me when I've had to rescue jars I've had fail.


You can also get a water filter that is meant to help with this sort of thing.

Here in the UK one of the most common brands is Brita, you simply put a couple of litres in a jug which has a filter in it, after filtration use it to make your tea.

I've not used it myself however so can't comment on its effectiveness.

You can also get these filters built into your taps.


Charles Darwin high altitude cooking of potatoes

My guess of what happened was that the potatoes were sitting in an open pot that was not in a rolling boil.  I'm going to assume that they went down from the pass and the place where "they took up [their] quarters" was at 11,000ft.  This region was then, as it is today, almost destitute of vegetation.  Darwin notes in the paragraph just before the potato comment that

  The root of a small scrubby plant served as fuel, but it made a miserable fire, and the wind was piercingly cold.

Temperatures in that region average close in the 2 to 4C in March.  The poor fuel and the winds make it likely that there was no rolling boil and that while parts of the pot may have been at 89C (the boiling temperature at 11000ft) it is likely that the rest of the pot was not.  The poor fuel and the cold and dry wind all contributed to the lower temperatures, not just the air pressure.  Bubbles form at the bottom of the pot and rise, so the water appears to be boiling, but it is far from the boiling temperature near the upper walls.

I have experienced this problem using my modern MSR backpacking stove, so I imagine it must have been harder with a camp fire.  I got the impression they were not carrying tents.  Darwin notes that the next day (after the night of the uncooked potatoes) they found shelter under "some large fragments of rock."   This makes it likely that there was no cooking inside some big tent and given the meagerness of their equipment, that the pots had no lids.

Darwin left Chile towards Mendoza on 18 March 1835 not along what are today Route 60 in Chile and Route 7 in Argentina, but up the Yeso Valley.  When you cross the border you go through the Piuquenes Pass, which is at 13,235ft.  What could be reached within a day's walk in the valley below is 10500ft or higher.  So the assumption of 11000ft for where the potatoes where boiled seems reasonable.

Blanching at low temperatures (between 55C and 75C) for a little less than half an hour is a known technique for adding firmness to fruits and vegetables that will later be cooked in some other form (see page 283 of McGhee).  Figure 2 in the study of potato blanching by Abu-Ghannam and Crowley, shows that potatoes cooked for an hour at 75C or lower had the same firmness of raw potatoes.  As the blanching temperature increases to 90C, the softness of a cooked potato is reached in 30 minutes, with 80C being the approximate transition temperature for going into the cooked state.

The results of Abu-Ghannam and Crowley are in line with some of the sous-vide results I have seen, but not all.  My guess is that depending on the balance between starch and cellulose the temperature at which pectin stops holding things together can vary.

Water boils at lower temperatures at higher elevations, but drops only to 80C at 19,000ft:

3353m  11,000ft  89C
4572m  15,000ft  85C
5791m  19,000ft  80C


What is the name of this Italian pastry?

I think you mean Strufoli.
It is indeed Italian and typical for Christmas.


You can freeze them after baking and then refresh them by letting them defrost all the way and then re-baking them for a few minutes. This gets back some of the crispiness but it won't be as good as freshly baked.


Traditional fermented pickles were kept in barrels, but they're not the kind that you buy in a big jar at Costco. Those pickles have been briefly cooked in a brine, and should be refrigerated after you open the jar. The salt and vinegar should keep them safe for a while, but they will likely go bad at room temperature before you finish eating the whole jar.

As an anecdotal note, an office I used to work in kept one of these large jars of pickles around. After being open for a few years, they were clearly spoiled, and nobody would touch them.


Why have a stainless steel griddle instead of simply a stainless steel pan?

A built-in griddle has much more area to work with, and is stationary relative to the cooktop, so wouldn't shift when you move food around on it.


Sprouts and "better-to-cut-out-parts" in vegetables

Unless you're planning to consume a few kilo of each of them in one sitting, I would say you're being too cautious. Tomato, bell peppers, chilis and potatoes are all part of the nightshades family, and are toxic to some degree. But the poison is in the dose. The amount contained with in the vegetables would mean you'll have to consume an inordinate amount of it for them to take effect.

I cut the sprouts of a potato, I have to peel them anyway. I usually cut away the "crown" of the tomato, mostly because it's tough and I don't want it in the dish. Most of the time, I don't even bother with the white parts of a paprika if I cook them, only in salads for cosmetic purposes I take them out. Onions just get peeled and used. So far, to no ill effect.

[EDIT]

As mentioned by Popup, be wary of green potatoes: Small sprouts or eyes on a potato aren't a problem; Cut them away as you find them. But do cut away green areas of a potato. As the article in the link tells, it's not that the green parts are solanine (the toxic), but rather an indication of areas where solanine build up takes place:

  "What is the green? Actually it’s chlorophyll. Not bad for you at all.
  But the chlorophyll indicates that the potato has been exposed to
  sunlight. And where the potato has been exposed to light is where a
  natural toxin in the potato (solanine) becomes concentrated at harmful
  levels"

No need to discard the entire potato, just get rid of the offensive parts, and when it makes sesnse, i.e.: If you need a microscope to spot it, or if it's the size a pins' head, so to speak, don't worry about it.


Why do some recipes recommend a short rest after mixing but before kneading the bread?

Besides the initial gluten relaxing that mrwienerdog wrote about, another important effect is the absorption of liquid.

It takes time for the flour to fully hydrate with the available liquid. Before it does the dough will be more sticky and there will be less gluten available for kneading. Giving the recently incorporated dough a short rest allows the flour to pull in all the liquid it can and become much easier to work with.

A similar effect can be seen with pastry doughs. Even though often the goal is to minimize gluten development, a short rest gives the flour time to hydrate and can turn pastry dough from difficult to work and crumbly to soft and smooth.


How can I make a super-thin, yet strong, calzone crust?

Don't use whole wheat flour if you want a strong or thin crust.

The shards of bran in the whole wheat flour will cut the strands of gluten, weakening the crust, which prevents it from being stretched very thin.

You can verify for yourself by performing the windowpane test.


A method to "speed up" marinating or an equivalent way to cook chicken

Marination can have a number of purposes and mechanisms, the biggest four of which I'll talk about here: Salt, acid, enzymes and miscellaneous flavour compounds.
Salt
Salt can do a few things; firstly and most obviously, it seasons; salt tastes good, and it makes things that already taste good taste even better. Salt can also make meat hold on to liquid better; as it permeates throughout the meat it interacts with some of the proteins, 'unfolding' them a little and making them less prone to tangle together and shrink on heating, meaning they'll squeeze out less liquid.
These processes take time, and for salt, generally, longer is better, though eventually, with enough salt and time, you're not so much marinating as curing your meat. For salt, it will take as much time as you give it, but even a short-term salting will improve your end product.
Acid
The second thing a marinade often has is acid. Fruit juice, vinegar and wine are all common acids for marinades, but there are many other options. Acid also works on the proteins in the meat, but it's not as gentle as the salt; a short marinade can tenderise, but a longer one - anywhere past a few hours - can denature the proteins so much that your meat turns mushy. For acid, a short marinade is generally best.
Enzymes
There are certain ingredients that contain enzymes that work on protein; some fruits, like pineapple, kiwi and papaya, some funguses like koji and to a certain degree fermented dairy like yoghurt will work on meat in a similar way to acid; tenderising, then after too much marination, rendering mushy and chalky in texture. Dairy and koji can be somewhat gentler here; tandoori chicken, for example, involves a reasonably long yoghurt-based marinade, but generally you want to have a good idea of what you're doing with enzymes and marination.
Everything else
Other components of marinades, be they spices, herbs, aromatics like garlic, shallot or onion, chillies and most anything else not included in the categories above, don't really penetrate into the meat, regardless of how long they're left marinating. The flavour molecules are simply too big to squeeze into the web of proteins, so they stay on the surface. As such, they're not generally very time sensitive in a marinade; once it's on the surface, it's going to stay there. Some oil or fat can help the fat-soluble flavours in some of these spread more evenly over the surface of the meat, but that's not really a time-sensitive operation either.
In conclusion, you might not need as long a marinade as you thought; the only thing that's really going to benefit from an overnight marinade is the salt, and even that is often happy enough with a shorter marinade. Oftentimes, overnight marinades are a result of convenience; if you left your meat marinating last night, then it's easier to just get home from work and cook it up, rather than having to do the marinade and then wait for it to take action before you can finally have dinner.


Bread breaks in the middle while in the oven

I would like to clarify a couple points from the question and the comments here.  First of all, remember that flour (wheat or spelt) does not contain gluten.  Gluten only forms as a complex protein once two simpler proteins in flour, gliadin and glutenin, are hydrated.  And while not all of the protein in flour will form gluten in the presence of water, the overall protein content in flour is usually used a  proxy to represent the gluten-forming capability of the flour.  So flours that are higher in protein typically form more gluten in the presence of water and kneading.

Now, having said all that, spelt 630 flour actually contains much more protein (~16%) than wheat 812 bread flour (~13%).  While 3% protein content might not sound like much, it makes a significant difference when making bread.

Again, your spelt 630 flour will generate MORE gluten in your dough than a typical bread flour.  It is considered a high-protein flour.

I would suggest that much of your problem might stem from over-kneading your bread.  Gluten in dough is a bread's best friend only up to a point.  If your gluten network in the dough is over-established, your baked bread will bake-up dense and dry and could conceivably split through during baking.

So a dough with overdeveloped gluten would be something like the proverbial hardwood tree in a storm - the tree that breaks because it doesn't bend.

While I believe the scoring point made above is absolutely relevant, I don't think an un-scored loaf would split through if there wasn't a problem with the bread dough itself.

I think the best solution to your splitting problem would be to mix-in some different lower protein flours to drop the protein content of the spelt flour.  If that option is off the table, then consider kneading much less (probably stay away from the mechanical kneading unless you're making batches too large to manage by hand).  If you can manage the kneading by hand, you should feel that magical dough elasticity that signals when it's time to stop.


How "old" are we talking about?

If the flour was white all purpose flour, was stocked in an airtight container, and your house gets not too hot in the summer I doubt the flour could have gone rancid. Rancidity is the deterioration of fats, and in wheat only the germ contains fat; white flour has been stripped off of wheat germ and therefore is very unlikely that it becomes rancid (anyway rancid flour is unlikely to make you sick)

Most flour deterioration comes from pests like meal moths, but you cannot miss them.

Nevertheless, if the cookies smell and/or taste bad you should throw them


Can cheesecake be cooked without a spring-form pan?

Alton Brown says never to cook a cheesecake in a springform pan. He uses a regular pan and lines it with parchment paper so that the cheesecake won't stick to the bottom.


Curious mold growth in a sealled BBQ, how does one avoid it?

Mold is growing because there's something for it to consume, the only way to prevent it from happening is to clean your grill more effectively, or carbonize it before the fire goes out. No grill is air-tight, so even though it gets a good heat blast (not enough to sterilize it as you may think), spores will get in from outside. Remember, hot air is less dense, so as the BBQ cools it will draw air in, hence the spores. Once there they thrive in the sheltered and often damp conditions in a closed-up barbecue.

I think where you may be going wrong is that you close the valves after cooking. That cuts off the air and kills the fire. I leave all my valves open to keep it as hot as possible after I'm done cooking, and it does a better job of charring all the leftovers.


It's a cast iron pan, it will behave like any other cast iron pan.

Le Creuset probably makes it "better" in some way (ie. maybe thicker material...), but that should not make it better than traditional ones.

From the description (google translate form german page you linked):
"Dishes from the Balti Dish are also called Karahi and are very similar to wok dishes"

From what I see from videos, it is used as a deep frying pan (like a cross between a wok and a regular sautee pan).

So in most case, there are not difference or advantages to the Balti Bowl over other pans.


What equation should I use for microwaving food?

In general, microwave meals are designed to be cooked to a safe temperature throughout, even when a microwave barely puts out the rated power, and that unevenly. This means the meals are designed to handle overcooking. Anyway power ratings are fairly inaccurate as they depend on how well the microwave radiation couples into the food - ratings are based around a defined portion though, so a ready meal isn't as likely to be poorly heated as something smaller.
So one simple approach is to follow the instructions for the highest power stated. This will work well for some things.
You can't assume you can just reduce the time in the same ratio the power is increased, because heat conduction is needed to cook the middle. This is particularly true if starting from frozen, or if it's something you can't stir.
What works for mine (1100W I think) is to use the 900 or 950W instructions, but reduce the time by a little - 30s on a typical single portion that cooks for 5-7 minutes , 1min on bigger things or from frozen, 10s on a dessert that heats up in 40-60s.
Crucially though, this is what I've concluded after trying it - stopping when stuff is bubbling, and checking it's hot through.
If the instructions are for a higher power than you have available, start by following them, then check. It may actually be hot enough but if not, give it a little longer, in the same increments as above (which are only a suggestion). You may find that you consistently need to add the same extra time for the meals you eat, once you've tested


What is the best material for a cooking spoon?

Personally, I've switched almost entirely to heat resistant silicone for all types of stirring and scraping spoons. They don't stain, they are fine up to quite high temperatures, they clean up easily and can go in the dishwasher. They are also won't scratch the surface of non-stick cookware.

It is true that they don't feel quite so nice as a good wooden spoon, but the convenience is outstanding. (On the other hand, I stick with metal for the type of spatula one uses to flip a fritter, because silicone can't have a thin enough leading edge, it is too flexible.)


How to achieve more solid consistency when preparing seitan from wheat flour?

The texture and yield is governed two factors: developing the gluten completely and washing out the bran and starch effectively.

To develop the gluten, combine the flour and water into a workable dough and give it 50 light strokes. Cover the bowl and let it rest 10-15 minutes. It is during this time that water chemically combines with the flour and the strands of gluten form. After resting, return to the dough and you will notice it has a different feel. It is because the gluten has formed. Knead the dough 100 times. Immerse the finished dough in ice water or at least very cold water for at least 30 minutes. An hour is better.

To effectively wash out the bran and starch it is essential to work the dough under alternating hot (as hot as your hands can take) and cold water baths with 30 minute rest intervals each time you change the water. Start with hot, work the dough with a spreading motion for a few minutes. Pour the water into a bucket (not down the sink!), cover with very cold water and let it rest 30 minutes. Repeat and cover with hot water. Let it rest 30 minutes each time. Usually during the third round the dough will very soft and your hand technique should become one of gathering instead of spreading. If it feels like you are on your way to pancake batter, pour it through a fine colander to gather the gluten and give it a cold water bath. In the last couple rounds it will become increasingly firm and the strands of gluten are evident.

Finally you have a ball about 1/3 the size of the original dough. I divide this into baseball sized pieces and drop them into a boiling pot. Return to boil and cook until the pieces float to the surface. Remove and put in cold water. The shape of the pieces is now set but they aren't yet fully cooked. From here cook in a broth seasoned to your liking. I simmer them for 2 hours in a simple kombu, tamari and water broth.

I use fine ground whole wheat flour. Stone ground will work but yields are lower and texture is inferior. My dough formula is 2600 gr fine whole wheat flour and 1900 gr cold water which produces 2000 gr finished seitan. Hope this is helpful!


Why did my vegan croissants come out flat?

If they're your first batch, you did great! Can you show us a cut cross-section? A croissant will have "intra-layer" (inside the dough layers) rise and "inter-layer" (between the layers) rise: The intra-layer rise comes from the yeast and moisture action in the dough itself, and the inter-layer comes from the steam generated as the moisture in the butter/margarine integrates with the dough. I would guess that you didn't get a lot of inter-layer rise, but that's just a guess.

I use the Tartine recipe for croissants (with regular butter), and from memory you work a small amount of flour - say 10% - into your butter before forming the butter sheet. I have seen plenty of recipes that don't do this, but I'm wondering if it would help to stabilise the margarine a bit during the bake.

One other tip, make sure everything stays cold during the laminating. I put my sheet into the freezer for 15 minutes between turns, and I know some methods call for a couple of hours in the fridge (which presumably helps with hydration as well as keeping things hard). If the layers are cold, they stay distinct, which means they separate cleanly during the bake.

Last thing, I think you could bake hotter and perhaps double-glaze (glaze half way through final proof, and then again right before you bake), to bring out the colour on the outside shell.

Good luck!


Rather than changing your recipe by adding preservatives, there a number of approaches you could use, depending on the acidity of your curry paste. At or above 4.6 pH would have to be pressure canned to avoid botulism, as it takes the temperature to 240°F / 116 C (a water bath heats to 212°F / 100 C).

The simplest way is to freeze the paste. Secondly, for an amount you're likely to use over the course of several months, it could be stored in the refrigerator. Heat the paste with a bit of oil and of water. Completely fill sterilized jars with the hot paste, close, and turn them upside down to cool completely before refrigerating.

If it is high acid, it can be water-bath canned: fill sterilized jars with the paste, top with sterilized lids and bands, and process the jars in boiling water. After cooling, check to ensure the lid is sealed; if not, it can be re-processed.


I think that it is doable, if the restriction doesn't require the dessert to be exactly a tiramisu.

Many dairy-based cremes are interchangeable, similar in texture, and require no eggs at all. The alcohol in some tiramisu versions can be safely left out. The short time is the worst restriction. Thickeners like agar agar may not set in the short time.

You should start with buying prepared lady fingers, as you can't bake them so quickly, and it is probably too much effort anyway. You can use any tiramisu recipe for the moistening liquid; if it includes alcohol, just leave it out. You can add a few drops of alcohol-free rum essence if it called for rum or another hard alcohol, or a fruit aroma if it called for a fruit liqueur. If it only specified coffee liqueur, leave out the liqueur but use normal coffee. You might want to use instant coffee dissolved in water instead of just-brewed espresso, because hot coffee will interfere with the short chilling time. Then you need the dairy creme, and you can finish with the traditional cocoa powder.

For the dairy creme, you have to choose one which will hold its shape without thickeners. You can add agar agar or carrageenan or the calcium-sensitive type of pectin, but don't trust them to turn a runny mass into a firm one, the time is too short. Use them as an insurance, and hoping that you will get something which gives some resistance to being cut or chewed, as opposed to being just scoopable. Whipped cream together with Greek yogurt is not a bad idea; other cultured milk products can work too, if they are on the firmer side. I have had similar desserts made with just schmand as the filling, but they stayed overnight so some whey could diffuse into the non-syruped cookies, making the cookies softer and the schmand drier. If you have access to the type of modified starch which will thicken without having to cook (for example sold as "cream stiffener", but also as a cream replacement product to be whipped with milk), using some of it may help. Don't use liquid sweeteners like corn syrup or honey, stay with sugar, and separate the whey from the yogurt to get a firmer result.

Another way would be to use a starch thickened pudding instead of a custard. This is a more common substitute, but normal starch has to be cooked to a boil, and will require longer chilling. You may be able to pull it off, if you make the whole dessert rather flat and wide, use a pre-chilled vessel and dip the ladyfingers into cold liquid, and then put the poured dessert into a freezer for a quick chilling. It will need quick work (so lots of time remains for chilling) and frequent attention so it can chill without freezing. The first version is probably less stress.

Whichever you choose, such a major recipe change is not easy. Make a prototype at home before you cook it for a crowd, so you can catch the major problems in an early version and relaxed environment, and then you will know if it is doable for sure.


How do you prepare bacalhau before cooking?

Basically it depends on how much salt (not how little water) there is in the fish. Here in Galicia and northern Portugal we usually soak it for 12 hours or so, changing the water once or twice. That will yield a slightly salty and tangy fish. If you don't like the salty edge and prefer it blander, soak it for 18 hours or so.


Butter separation in english toffee candy

Butter separation doesn't only refer to the butter separating from the toffee (sugar), butter is make of milk fat rendered and the milk solids, when butter separates this is due to these parts separating. This is the fat that you see on the toffee, this usually comes from the components cooling at different speeds.

As with anything that you are making using melted butter, like a hollandaise sauce, adding a spoon or two of very hot water and agitating helps with the dispersion of both the fats and the heat. Stirring is an important component to ensure the heat is equally distributed throughout the mixture.

Thanks to @Aaronut for correcting the language!


How can I improve the shape/appearance of this bread?

Before we start on what might have gone wrong, let me assure you that you obviously are doing a lot of things right:

You have surface tension in your loaf and good oven spring, meaning you got the shaping right and seem to put your bread in the oven at a good time during the final rise - my guess would be "slightly underproofed", which is exactly what you want for a wheat bread like this one.

With your slashes I suggest that you dump the X-acto, because the blade is too short. The classic lamé is one possible route (and can be easily substituted by an oldfashioned razor blade on a chopstick), but you probably need a few more loaves to get the hang of using it - you need to work fast and the bent blade and thin handle is different from what you are used from kitchen knives. A serrated knife is a viable alternative, provided it is quite sharp. Whatever you use, you don't want to use a "sawing" or "zig-zaging" motion, but just one quick swiping movement per slash.

The higher the hydration the more likely is your slash to seal itself again, simply by the weight of the dough. Therefore an almost horizontal slash is recommended. The idea is to create a "flap", not a "valley". The thin flap will become the "ear" as the two overlapping parts drift apart due to oven spring. For a loaf like yours, I personally aim for a cut of almost an inch. This is no hard and fast rule, every dough and bread type is different. Once you get the basic technique right, you can experiment.

Note that the bread will expand perpendicular to the cut, so diagonal cuts should be always oriented mostly along the long axis and multiple cuts should be running parallel for quite a bit. More crosswise cuts will create the "bulge" that can be seen on your loaf, almost as if the loaf "arches its back".

Good steaming will keep the crust pliable, so that oven spring can open the slashes well.


Why does frozen spinach have so much less iron than fresh spinach?

Judging by the nutrition information I can easily find (for example, from nutritiondata.self.com), frozen spinach is generally cooked by boiling and draining. That's pretty much what I'd have guessed; it's certainly the easy way to cook things.

Unfortunately, that means that some nutrients are lost with the discarded water. I doubt it'd be different for any other green leafy vegetable - though it's certainly much harder to find frozen mustard greens!

The nutrition information for fresh spinach is for fresh, raw spinach; if you boiled and drained it, you'd make the same sacrifice that the frozen spinach has.

As for your generalization, freezing vegetables and fruits does preserve most things pretty well - but only what's actually left in them when they get frozen! And while transporting fresh vegetables around can cost you some "freshness", it's not going to affect minerals. Some vitamins could be lost by breaking down (I'm not an expert here, but it seems possible) since they're more complex molecules, but minerals are just single elements. Those iron atoms won't fall out of the spinach on the way, and they're certainly not going to be transmuted, either!

Edit: Essentially what's been said in the comments is that the USDA nutrition facts say that "Spinach, frozen, chopped or leaf, cooked, boiled, drained" has about half as much iron as "Spinach, cooked, boiled, drained". A discrepancy, indeed, though not the same one cited in the question. My interpretation here is that the frozen spinach is simply not cooked in the same way (boiled and drained more thoroughly) as the non-frozen.

An alternative, proposed by Adisak, is that the frozen spinach nutrition means that you've taken the already-cooked, frozen spinach and boiled it again and drained away even more nutrients. This seems unlikely; frozen spinach is already cooked, so there's no reason for the nutrition information to assume that you'll boil it over again. The description (it seems to me) is referring to the cooking that took place before it was frozen.


How did I screw up this rice pudding recipe?

I've never made a baked rice pudding before but I have a couple of guesses at what went wrong...
1. Chosen rice preparation method caused loss of needed starch.
First, I don't think the type of rice matters much but I will say that your method differs from the standard method in the US for cooking rice. Generally, we boil the rice with about twice the volume of water as rice until all of the water is absorbed. There's no dumping out extra water or rinsing.
This may not make the best rice for direct consumption but it concentrates the starches because none of them escape when you drain off the water or, worse, rinse it.
This starch is probably at least some of what helps the rice thicken while being baked... so your soupy result is because there wasn't enough thickening agent.
2. Stiffly beaten egg whites means something special.
I can't stress enough, when cooking, if you want to be successful, look up any terms you don't understand... or come and ask us here... that's what we're here for.
Regular egg whites look like this (all images taken from the Joe Pastry link below):

Egg whites that have been "stiffly beaten" look like whipped cream. They have peaks that stand up on their own when the whisk is removed from the bowl. This Joe Pastry page has a guide to the method for achieving this.
The ones below are soft peaks - see how they fold over at the tips?

And here is your target, "stiff peaks". No folding tips, dense foam.

If your egg whites looked more like the first picture, they won't do their job of adding structure to your pudding.

Stiffly beat egg whites and fold into mixture.

The word "fold" is important here. To avoid breaking the egg whites back down into mush, you gently fold them into the pudding so that they retain their structure for their time in the oven.
So, I think that these two issues will be your main culprits for why this recipe failed on you.

Additional possible but less troublesome issues:

Milk percentage - The milk percentage probably didn't matter but it's probably going to be better in the end if you use whole milk. My go-to recipe uses whole milk and half and half (and no eggs), so it's much richer than this one... it's also a stovetop method and it's amazing.

Egg size - The standard for eggs in recipes in the US is usually "large" sized eggs (~2 oz/~56 g) unless otherwise noted, so if you used medium in the US or Canada (~1.75 oz/~49 g), that will make a bit of difference as the egg is your main thickening agent in addition to the starch - but if you're in the UK or Europe, I believe the equivalent for that is "medium", so that shouldn't be an issue. Info on egg sizes in different countries on Wikipedia.

Oven temperature - Your oven could be off but if you find it generally performs well, this likely isn't the issue, particularly considering all of the other issues.


If you can shrink wrap them, do that.  They will likely get sticky if they are just bagged.  Manufactures bag them air-tight to keep the humidity out.  Per @sourd'oh pertinent note:

  "sugars you've inverted by cooking the syrup will become very hygroscopic and absorb humidity from the air"

Burying them in a bag of rice might protect them from humidity as well as preventing from looking as chalky as they would with confectioners sugar or corn starch. Speculating on the type of rice? I'd say Sushi rice would be least chalky.

p.s.  Chef Hats off- they look awesome!


In most instances I've seen, in American cookbooks, "red pepper" refers to cayenne pepper or chili powder (not the spice mix designed for making chili con carne, but dried, ground chilis). It is usually spicy rather than being red bell pepper.

Edit to add: I'm talking about this type of product:

McCormic Ground red pepper

Source


How to consistently get golden beads on meringue topping?

That's your meringue weeping. You could either make a very unstable meringue, which will weep uncontrollably, or you can replicate the effect with caramelised sugar - the latter is probably better for consistency and not-having-a-sloppy-mess-on-top-of-your-cheesecakeness.


What makes a bread either close or open crumbed/textured?

There are several factors that make bread be "holey". First of all we must understand that those big holes are created by "balloons" of gluten filled with CO2 and alcohol made by yeasts. Those balloons can grow in 2 ways

Yeast cells close to the balloon make CO2 or alcohol, and it's "poured" into the balloon, and it grows.
The wall between 2 balloons gets broken, so a new balloon is made with the joining of the former two.

You would also get some bubbles with rye bread and bacteria, but the holes would be smaller. So I'll focus on wheat flour and yeasts.

So, some tips to maximize the size of the holes:

Please, note that those points are not independent. Thanks @rumtscho for pointing it out.

Don't manipulate the dough too much.

Most breads have 2 fermentations: bulk one and proofing. Do just one. The more you handle the dough, the higher chances to degas it by breaking bubbles and letting the gas get out of the dough.
High hydration

With more water the dough will be less stiff, so bubbles will be able to extend more. Also, it will be easier for the yeasts to "find" their food: sugar, so they'll produce more CO2 and alcohol.

Some flours absorb more water than others. Using a flour with high absorption index might allow you
Yeast + time

The more yeasts, the more gas will be made. But be aware not to add too much, or they'll run out of glucose. It's better to give them time to do their work.
Use strong wheat flour

The more time dough is waiting to be risen, the more gluten will be destroyed by enzymes. So using flour with a lot of gluten (strong, high % proteins, a W value over 270) will help assuring a minimum of gluten will still exist after long fermentations.
Oven spring

Yeasts continue producing CO2 until they die at 60C/140F. Also, gasses expand with heat, so it will also help holes to grow a bit (if I remember well, up to 30%). But that grown will stop when dough gets baked and strengthens, and when crust begins to form. To retard this 2 tricks are used:

Use steam  in the oven the fist 1/3 or 1/4 of baking time.

Steam will keep the "outer skin" of the bread humid, so it will prevent it from getting dry and forming the crust.
Score the bread

Bread is slashed (those cuts made in its surface) to allow it to grow more easily. So inner bubbles will be able to grow more in the oven.

To allow heat enter in the dough from the bottom to up, bakers use stones in their ovens.
Develop the gluten completely

Kneading is very important, so the gluten network will perfectly developed to retain all the CO2 and alcohol.

To get high hydration doughs, bakers make a normal hydration dough (approx. 66%) with all the flour, and then add the rest of water and knead a bit more to let it absorb it.

An example of a type of bread with big holes can be seen in this Spanish forum (sorry: it's a Spanish bread and I couldn't find it in English).

Ciabattas are also a good example of big holes bread.

Some tips to minimize the holes:

Low hydration

As opposite to high hydration to get big alveolus. As low as 50%
Degas the dough

Some artisan or home bakers press the dough with their hand to avoid having too big bubbles. For certain types of bread, professional bakers use rolls to make a thin one. It's called refinement, and might be made several times (maybe 5 during proofing).
Weak flour.

With less gluten, the bubbles will break letting the gas go out of the dough.
Underproof

Use a short fermentation time so yeasts won't be able to make too much CO2.
Pierce the dough

So any excess of CO2 will leave through the holes, instead of getting kept inside the dough.

Also, to lower the production rate of the yeasts, you can also add a lot (really a lot) of salt, or a lot of sugar, or grease/oil.

As an example, a couple of breads (again in Spanish): Pan Candeal and Bollo Sevillano.


Dennis,

Welcome to the site!  Generally we focus on the "how to make food" side here, but I thought I'd suggest some things to consider from a layman's perspective.  There is no standard formula for how to figure this out because so much depends on your exact situation.  (The amount of meat per sandwich is the result of your own cooking style.)  Be forewarned - lots of research and math is ahead of you!

You need to make a profit, so first you need to figure out how much it costs you to make the brisket sandwiches.  What are your food costs (include transportation costs)?  (It's important to keep your portions uniform for all units; consider using a measuring cup to dish out the meat per sandwich.)  What is the cost of your time (including shopping, cooking, cleaning, advertising, and selling)?  What is the cost to construct it (your charcoal / electricity, and new equipment)?  How much does it cost you to sell it (napkins and other service ware, table, stall rental, advertising,)?  Even if you're working "under the radar" for now, eventually you'll have to get licenses, permits and a food-legal kitchen, and you may have to change your prices then.  Consider it all, and add it all up.

Once you've got a well researched amount for the costs, divide that by the number of units (sandwiches) that you produce.  You need to make at least that much to break even.  Probably you want to charge at least twice that (probably higher).

Analyze whether that price you've come up with will work in your target market.  Do you need to increase the price to avoid leaving money on the table?  Look at your competition - how much are they charging?  Price is a funny thing - and you'll have to massage it a lot.  (If you undercut the competition by a lot, you may just have a lowered perception of quality rather than more customers.  But if you're much higher than the competition, customers may never try you.)  You can also consider selling the sandwiches at not much of a profit, and hoping to make up the difference with soda pop or sides.

Good luck!


Why not make sourdough bread from young starter?

The advice to let the culture mature before you use it is targeted to getting reliable results. A mature sourdough culture has a relatively small number of strains of microorganism, which have outcompeted the others and formed a relatively stable ecology (assuming a regular feeding schedule). At that point the culture is reliable because newly introduced strains can't compete with the established ones. A new sourdough culture may work fine (particularly if you're seeing vigorous activity), or it may be not great, or it may be the best sourdough you've ever tasted. But the bread you make with it today may be significantly different from next week's.
As an example, if you got a bit of commercial bread yeast in there, the bread yeast is going to go crazy. But that yeast strain doesn't do well with low pH, so once the lactobacillus gains a toehold it'll slow down and be replaced by a hardier strain of saccharomyces. Fine bread this week; fine bread next week; but two different breads.
Bottom line: if you like the look of it, no reason not to use it today. Just don't generalize from the results.


How do I get rid of that calcium chloride taste in my tomato sauce?

To begin with, you can microwave the tomato before cooking it in the pan; this will also shorten the cooking time. Doing this, the tomato "grains" will already be hot inside when they begin to cook from the outside in the pan. You'll still get the external "roasted" feel but with a softer texture.

You can compensate for the citric acid, and for the excess of the tomatoes' own acid, by adding some sugar.

In order to hide the metallic taste, add some herbs. Try one leaf of bay laurel; or a combination of dry herbs like savory, fennel, basil, thyme, and oregano.


I use canning jars for my teriyaki which I seal in a boiling bath for 15 minutes. You can find canning jars and lids at many grocery stores as well as some hardware stores and variety stores such as Walmart.


You didn't heat it enough. "Turning light amber" means that you want caramel. What you did instead was to evaporate water from a sugar syrup, without reaching caramelization temperature. The crystals are not unusual (at some point you get a supersaturated syrup, after enough water has evaporated), but it is better if they don't happen, so don't give them occasion (use a clean pot, don't stir, etc. I suspect the oiling of the pan is meant to reduce nucleation sites).

The recipe is a bit strange anyway, using way too much water. Maybe you can try another one, if this has negative comments. The regular recipes will use some more conventional nut instead of pumpkin seeds, but this doesn't affect the physics of making the caramel. And do yourself a favor and use a candy thermometer. There are experienced cooks who can make sugar candy without one, but if you are not one of them, you'll save yourself lots of errors (and probably enough money in expensive ingredients for the thermometer to pay for itself).

Here is another recipe for brittle. While I haven't tried to make it, I strongly suspect that they know better what they are doing - not at least because they give you the exact temperatures you are aiming for. This is a site with lots of useful tips for candy making, and if you really want to try this without a thermometer, use their chart to learn about the different stages of sugar syrup and caramel.

And choose your recipes carefully. Candymaking (both sugar and chocolate) is even more exact than baking. Directions like "put back on medium for some time" are practically useless. In order to successfully cook a candy recipe, you have to know if not the exact temperature, then at least the desired sugar syrup stage. Maybe somebody who has made lots of brittles could work with a recipe like the foodnetwork one, noticing the problems on the fly and making the appropriate corrections towards the ideal brittle mass. If you don't know what the ideal brittle mass looks like before you start, it is better not to try it that way and go for an exact recipe.


Torte Milanese without puff pastry dough

If you use something other than puff pastry it's not a Torte Milanese anymore, and other kinds of pastry will not hold together in the same way puff pastry does. Puff pastry's layers provide a certain amount of strength and will help keep the shape when sliced, other pastries will crumble much more easily. You can use short crust or any other pastry, it won't be the same but maybe that's not so important to you.

You could of course just buy pre-made puff pastry, there's no shame in that. Puff pastry is challenging and time-consuming to make, and in many places you can buy frozen pre-made all butter puff pastry which gives excellent results. I've made puff pastry, but when I need it I usually buy it as I don't have hours free to spend on it.

One option would be to make "rough puff" pastry, also known as "flaky pastry" rather than full-blown puff pastry. It's less time consuming, a bit more forgiving, and will still give a similar product.


How to get those professional looking peaks on top of tiramisu?

You probably wont be able to get that exact result with a pastry bag because the almost perfect square grid they are divided into. I still think a pastry bag will be your best bet.

I am not sure were you got that picture but my guess is that the tiramisu was machine made and the marks and peaks are from the tooling that was made for the machine to deliver the mascarpone topping.

I would try a good sized round tip on a pastry bag and make my dot and slowly raise up and cut it off by stopping the pressure on the bag and pulling straight up.  It has worked for me in the past.

My background is not in pastry though so you may also just go to a local bakery or wedding cake designer and ask how they would do it.  They will probably tell you.