How do you cook grass-fed beef so it is not tough? I recently went to a farmers market and bought some grass-fed beef.  I went with what we normally buy, and got a couple of bone-in thick cut ribeye.  I typically prepare this by liberally applying salt and pepper, letting it come to room temp, grilling (gas) over high heat for a few minutes on each side to about 125-130, then letting it rest for 10 minutes or so.  This gets it to a good medium-rare after resting.  I then slice it across grain, cutting each piece about .25 inch think.

This works great, and loved it every time.  I love the ribeye since it has a good amount of fat (thus flavor), and it not too tough.

The guy we bought the grass-fed beef from warned us that they typically are a little tougher and less fatty so they typically marinate overnight.  I thought this was odd for a ribeye, and prepared it like normal.

Although the flavor was VERY BEEFY (almost too much), way more than the typical high end (probably corn fed) beef we buy, it was SO tough.  It was like leather.  I guess this is not uncommon for grass-fed beef, but what should I do next time to make this more enjoyable?

Marinate?  Emulate dry aging by cooking low temp for a while, then grilling?  Any other tips?

This is total nonsense: grass fed ribeye should absolutely not be tough. Toughness is, however, affected by the cow's breed, it's age, by how stressed it was when it was slaughtered, by ageing of the meat, and I'm sure a bunch of other variables too. Something made the meat tough, but it wasn't grass feeding - the combination of strong beefy flavour and toughness might suggest an old cow, for instance. Next time choose grass-fed beef raised by a different farmer.

Commercial beef producers take a number of steps to ensure a tender product reaches the shelves. Most notably, aging the beef - allowing the meat to become tender through the application of time. Fresh-from-the-farm beef could probably stand a bit of dry-aging to make it properly tender. This involves storing the meat at near-freezing temperatures in a fridge for a number of days, wrapped in cheesecloth that is changed as fluid seeps out of the meat. I would recommend purchasing a roast and carving it into steaks before cooking than dry aging the steaks themselves.


Why asafoetida clumps in hot oil? Introduction

While making vegetable recipe we generally initiate with same procedure for every vegetable i.e. in 2 spoon of hot oil we put mustard, cumin, and asafoetida before adding pieces of any vegetable.

Question

Why does asafoetida clump after putting into hot oil? How to avoid this?

Reference -

Video -- Please refer initial process only in this video. Although she has not added asafoetida. I am just telling to refer initial common procedure for understanding.

Following is another image for reference

Naturally, asofoetida  is obtained as a hard gummy resin from trees. In order to make it easier to measure and add to your cooking, it is powdered and sold. But, asofoetida being a resin in nature gets clumped in the package if not coated with some agent. In India, it is usually coated with flour. Flour when put in oil gets fried. So what you see clumping isn't asofoetida, it's the flour in it.


Why don't my muffins rise and develop tops properly? I would like to make muffins that have that "spilled over" look that shop bought muffins have, but no matter what I do, the ones I make always look flat or only just reach the top of the paper cases.

What can I do to make the muffins rise more and have wide tops?

There are many reasons why muffins might not rise as expected; I'll list the ones I know of in order of probability:

Over-mixing the batter.  You'll know that you've done this if the muffins also turn out tough and chewy.  This prevents rising because the gluten network is too tight to expand around the gas bubbles.
Under-mixing the batter.  You have to develop some gluten, otherwise there's nothing to trap the gas bubbles and the muffins will just deflate before they get any rise.  It's a lot easier to over-mix than under-mix, but if you drastically under-mix and don't even bother to get all the dry ingredients wet, then you won't get any leavening action at all.
Not enough leavening agent. This can happen with unsifted flour (sifting also helps incorporate air), using the wrong type of flour (especially if the recipe calls for self-raising), or using old or improperly-stored flour or baking soda/powder.  You should be able to see some bubbling action before you pop the muffins in the oven; if you don't, you might have this problem.
Improper substitution of baking soda for baking powder.  A lot of people think these are the same, but they aren't.  Both use sodium bicarbonate, which is what produces the CO2 bubbles but needs an acid in order to do it.  Baking soda is intended to be used with mixtures that are already acidic; baking powder has an built-in acidifier, usually cream of tartar, which reacts with the water as soon as you incorporate it.  If you ever substitute baking soda for baking powder, you need to add cream of tartar or some other acid/acidifier.
Not resting the batter, or resting too long.  If you use double-action baking powder (the norm, e.g. Magic brand) then you are supposed to rest for 5-10 minutes to allow for the first action.  If you use single-action baking powder, you must get those muffins into the oven right away or they'll start to collapse.
Finally, and this might be stating the obvious - not filling the tins enough.  It's possible that the muffins are rising just fine, but they're not supposed to double in size like bread or triple like pastries; you should be filling the tins at least 3/4 of the way up if you want tops.

I have always found that when mixing the batter, the mix needs to stand for at least 15-20 minutes so that it can expand.  Only then do you put the mix into the muffin pan and into the oven. This insures that the muffins will rise, stay moist inside, and taste real good.


How to modify a quick bread recipe to add spice / tea flavors? I have a trusty pumpkin bread that I make countless loaves of every year.  My wife and I love Chai Tea and I was curious how one could go about adapting the linked recipe above to include Chai spices or some type of Chai tea as part of the ingredients.  To me this seems like the best convergence of many tasty flavors for the fall.

I just noticed that your recipe uses water. That's an ideal way to get tea flavor into things - you can replace it with concentrated tea. Assuming you use teabags, you should be able to steep two in that 2/3 cup of water. Tea is a fairly subtle flavor, so you may not taste it too much in the bread, but this is easy and doable with what you have! There's also instant tea, if you want to try to boost it - but it of course won't be as good as real, fresh tea. (You could buy chai concentrate, but I think it's usually about double strength, so not really better than you'll do on your own.)

I'd then replace the spices normally in your recipe with chai spices. If you've ever made chai from scratch, you could use that recipe as a guide, but it sounds like you might not have. There's an awful lot of variety here, from region to region, and in Western variations; you could search around online for chai recipes that appeal to you. I'm not an expert (I'm from Texas!) but from what I know, here are some common spices, with the most standard ones toward the top:

cardamom
cinnamon
fresh ginger
black pepper
fennel
cloves

Cardamom is pretty much required, and that'll help give you a flavor very different from your usual spice blend. I'd mix/grind up the spices separately from the rest, smell them to see if they're what you're looking for, and adjust as needed before mixing into the rest. Aiming for a similar total volume of spices to that of the original recipe should work fairly well. It might be a bit spicier, since you'll also have the tea, but that's probably fine. (Fresh ginger obviously won't go with the dry spices, if you use it - maybe a teaspoon or two minced?)

what's wrong with opening the tea bag and pouring the spices into the batter?


What is direct heat? Why is it that when I check google images for Direct heat, I see pictures of a flame under a grid like surface?  Is that direct, or indirect?

And what'd you call sticking a marshmallow directly in a flame to toast it? no grid at all. Is there a unique name for that?

Direct vs. Indirect Heat are terms usually used when referring to American style BBQing or grilling. While the terms can apply to other areas of cooking as well their usefulness makes the most sense in this context.

Direct Heat

A method of heat transfer in which heat waves radiate from a source (for example, an open burner or grill) and travel directly to the item being heated with no conductor between heat source and food. Examples are grilling, broiling, barbecueing, and toasting. (source)

Keep in mind that the grill itself doesn't really act as a conductor as much as a way to hold the food in a static position relative to the heat source. To better understand direct heat, understand it's complement:

Indirect Heat

When using indirect heat, your goal is to never have any part of the meat directly over flames or charcoal. You can only do indirect cooking with a charcoal or gas grill that has a cover. In this respect, it acts very much like a convection oven... the heat swirls around the inside of the grill and the meat is cooked from all angles. This also eliminates the need to 'flip' or turn your meat during the cooking process. (source)

This is generally used to cook large pieces of heat that need a long time to cook. A smoker is an example of the kind of equipment used to cook with indirect heat.

LOL this is getting silly - what are we going to say about induction hobs, rotisseries, and microwaves?

Perhaps we should think more deeply. Let me suggest that direct heat means heat directly applied to the food from a source that is red hot or hotter - flames are hotter than that by definition. That way electric heating is also accommodated.


How can I replicate the flavor of Mountain Dew? Mountain Dew is often described as 'citrus' flavor but that is a broad range of fruits with infinite possible combinations. It does have orange juice in the ingredients, but also "natural flavor". How can I recreate the flavor of Mountain Dew using ingredients available to me, such as fruit juices, with no added sugar or caffeine?

OK, this is dangerously close to a recipe request, but far enough away that I feel OK to answer.

Use the rule of two.

2 cups of sugar
2 two oranges
2 limes
2 lemons

Juice and zest the whole fruit.

Strain and and fill to 1 gallon with water. Filter if you want it to be clear.

Carbonate using whatever technique you normally use whether that's a Cornelius keg or soda stream.

I drink Diet Dew daily am to pm. At times I sensed one of the complexity of 3-4 citrus flavors is a hint of grapefruit.


What does tin foil do when baking a pot pie? If you buy a pot pie at the store, the cooking instructions say to fold a strip of tinfoil around the edge before putting it in the oven.  I've seen what happens if I forget to do this: the edge gets all burned.  Apparently the foil helps keep some of the heat off.

Something strange happened to a friend of mine a while ago, though: she had never made one of these before, and she misread the instructions and put a sheet of tinfoil over the entire top of the pie.  It turned into a bit of a mess; after baking, the whole thing was only about half cooked!

That makes me wonder: what exactly is the foil doing?  It's nice and shiny, and if this were being cooked under a really powerful heat lamp I could understand how it would reflect a lot of the light away, but this is a conventional oven.  Heat is transferred from the air into the food by convection, and aluminum is a very good conductor of heat, so intuitively I'd think it would do practically nothing at all to keep the heat off.  But clearly it's actually being very effective, so what's going on?

There are three modes of transfer of heat, as you already mentioned: convection, conduction and radiation. In everyday life, practically all heat sources employ all three of them, although the ratios differ. You certainly have all three of them in an oven.

The foil slows down all three modes of heat transfer, but not equally. First, it is intransparent (or nearly so) for infrared. So, the whole infrared component is practically eliminated. This comes in very handy when you happen to have food whose surface is already well browned but the inside is not yet ready: you cover with foil on top and continue baking.

The convection is also made much less efficient. Normally, the oven heats the air near the top and the bottom, the air in the oven moves around due to a heat gradient and frequently a ventilator, and so you get hotter air surrounding your food, ready to conduct heat to it. When you cover your food in foil, the hottest air cannot reach the food while it moves around. The only air touching the food is the one trapped under the foil, and that never goes to the heater.

Third, there is conduction. Conduction is never perfectly efficient. So instead of having the air conduct heat to your food, you have the air conduct heat to the foil, and then the foil conduct heat partly to the food itself (where it's touching it) and partly to the air trapped inside, which then conducts to the food. Now, instead of one energy-loss step, you have two or three of them. "Good conductor" means that this loss is less than with other materials, but it is not zero.

Then you get a ton of other, more complicated effects. When you bake food, moisture evaporates from the surface. If it gets trapped below a foil, you have a much moister environment, and get a different baking result than without the trapping (although that one is mostly noticeable in the baked surface and less in the centre of the baked or roasted food).

So, physics easily explain that indeed, adding a sheet of foil (or other material) will give you very different results from "naked" baking.

Y'all got too deep lol the aluminum just slows down the heating process on the crust, aluminum foil doesn't get hot


Yorkshire Pudding Batter -- Letting it "Rest" I've heard it's a good idea to let your batter rest overnight.  Since there are eggs in it, I would think that it would have to rest in the refrigerator.  I've also heard that the batter should be at room temperature when you pour it into the pan.  So, should you refrigerate the batter overnight, and then let it sit outside the fridge for a three or four hours to warm it back up to room temperature?

I previously addressed this on a related question here. I cited Kenji Lopez-Alt's great article about Yorkshire puddings based on his testing a variety of recipes. For the full thing, you can find it on Serious Eats. As to resting and batter temperature, this is what he says:

Resting Batter:

This was what the tester determined made the largest difference in the quality of the finished product:

  I'm going to say this: Resting your batter is the single most important step you can take to improving Yorkshire pudding and popovers. Not only do they come out taller, they also come out much tastier, with a more complex, toasty flavor. Non-rested-batter puddings taste positively flat (literally and figuratively) next to rested-batter puddings.

  I'd go so far as to say that resting at least overnight is essential if you are really after the best.

Batter temperature:

  Warmer batter will create taller, crisper puddings with a more hollow core
  Colder batter will create denser puddings with a more distinct cup.

So, definitely rest your batter (in the fridge!) and pick the batter temperature that matches the outcome you'd prefer.

I used my batter straight out of the fridge. Hubby said they where the best he’d ever had. I didn’t rest the batter mix. They came out of the oven, light and beautifully risen.  In future I’ll always use thus way. My York Puds where like a pros! Well chuffed.


How can I get brine flavour into turkey? Since I started doing holiday dinners, I've always brined my birds. I love the result, but I find that while the turkey comes out nice and moist, it doesn't pick up much flavour from the brine. For Thanksgiving, I had a delicious smelling brine with some star anise, cinnamon, and a few other things. The turkey didn't seem to pick up any of this flavour.

Any tips on solving this problem? Would injecting the meat help?

Many aromatic compounds are oil soluble, or need to be heated to really come out and 'open up.' Since brines I use are all water based, I've had some luck with heating, even briefly boiling dried spice components first, then cooling, adding the other ingredients, then using. Especially, don't boil vinegar or alcohol components, as they will lose potency.

Anyway, I find brines to have a tough job imparting too much of a distinct flavor, so consider straining some of this out of your brine and using it to make a gravy or pan sauce to accompany the roast bird, the flavors will then be further accentuated.

Spices and herbs are fat soluble. This means that they need to have fat to release the flavours. You will not get large flavour profiles from a brine. The best you will get are hints or what is in the brine. Smaller peices of protein will pick up more flavour then large ones.
Brine is meant to protect the muscle fibres from becoming to dry or tough.


What is the biggest safe container for soup? What is the biggest safe container for soup?  The soup comes out of the slow cooker at a high temperature (not measured), but I need to refrigerate it for storage, and that means that it needs to be cooled down rapidly.  That means small containers.

How small should the containers be?  They are standard plastic — I don't have anything fancy.

Currently, I put them into containers and place them in the fridge, but that is all.  Should I cool them in water?

You said the containers are plastic so you have already determined the size of the container. If the containers are clean and sanitary then they are safe. The only important part is cooling the soup down fast enough so it stays out of the "danger zone"; that is, above 40F for more than two hours. So however long that takes will take experimentation or applied physics knowledge or experience.

You can gain experience by heating some water to a simmer as you would for soup (I think). Then see how long it takes you to cool it to 40F. If you can do that in less than two hours, you're cool and safe.

The largest safe container is only constrained by your refrigerated storage space.

In and of itself, simply moving your soup from the cooking pot to smaller containers is not a sufficient cooling technique in most cases. Cooling is important, not only for the product that you are preparing to store, but, perhaps more importantly, for the products in your refrigerator that you risk warming up when you place a hot product nearby.

There are many techniques for cooling, which can be found using the search bar.  Here is one I haven't seen:  If you want to cool a large amount of soup quickly, you can freeze water in quart containers.  Then, with the containers sealed, float them in a large bowl or pot of hot soup.  Stir gently.  The soup will soon be cool enough for storage.  Once cooled, you could stick the entire pot in the refrigerator, or transfer to smaller containers.


How do I stop my pans from boiling over? Yesterday the wife and I decided to boil some potatoes in a normal non-stick pan.

We added salt,  potatoes and boiling water.  We put this on an electric hob, with no lid at maximum heat (marked at 6, which is ~10 times hotter than our 5 setting.  From experience, the remaining settings decrease operating temperature linearly). When come to the boil we cover with a lid.

Almost immediately they boil over,  spilling water across the hob. We remove the pan from heat, remove the lid, put the pan back on heat, turn down to setting 3, and wait.  Once at the lower temperature,  we replace lid. The pan boils over.

I know the basic mechanism behind boiling over.  Some agent increases the surface tension of the bubbles, causing many bubbles to form and then boil over. I am guessing that it is the starch. I don't know what factor the lid plays,  as occasionally the pan boils over without the lid on.

Is there anything I can do? Are the pans not clean enough? Not enough/too much salt?  Wrong type of salt?

I've heard of the wooden spoon trick, but I actually want to tackle the root cause.  Plus most of my spoons are silicone, and the trick doesn't work with them.

So what can I do to prevent boiling over?

You are doing precisely the opposite of 'normal' procedure, which is to put the lid on the pan until the water starts boiling, then remove the lid (either partially or completely) to prevent boiling over. A reduction in the hob temperature will also probably be necessary, and is in any case desirable - mercilessly boiling any vegetable is rarely a good thing.

With the lid off, heat is lost at the top of the pan at a rate which is usually sufficient to prevent boiling over. With the lid on, much of the heat is retained, which A) helps the water come up to a boil quicker and B) causes it to boil over much more easily.

See this answer for more information.

Why not use a bigger pan?

If the pan is less than two thirds full, you should bring the contents to the boil, then turn it down and as the water boils it will cool as it fills the larger space and drop back into the pan and not boil over.


Butter substitute for 1 cup of butter for baking What can I substitute for 1 cup of butter in baking recipes (e.g. cookies, muffins, cakes, etc.)?

I'm looking for something that has less saturated fat (and  also doesn't have trans fat).

Update: Since baking is less forgiving than cooking (i.e. if you don't use the exact amount of each ingredient the recipe might fail), could you please also include the amount you would need to use to replace 1 cup of butter?

In muffins and quick breads, I have found that you can actually substitute apple sauce for oil or melted butter. This has worked very well for me!

Use the same amount of apple sauce that you would oil/butter, if not a bit extra.

Any oil is the best solution I tried it and it tasted perfect


What type of wok apparatus is depicted in this home? The following looks like a standalone burner, not just a wok ring. What is it called? What would the power output be like? Where can I find more information?

The upper green arrow looks like it is pointing to a frying/draining rack on the inside edge of the wok.  The lower green arrow looks to be pointing to the base of a wok rink to a wok range.  There would usually be another flashing or baffle to prevent the intense fire burning your hands or wok handle.  It may be on the other side of the picture.  That would be my best guess on it.

This is a hibachi, which makes this answer confusing, because what westerners call hibachi is actually called teppenyaki (flat top stylized and often theatrical cooking).

Further more the "grill", is not really called hibachi either, but rather shecherin. It was easier for Americans to say hibachi so that's what it's called. You can put a grill plate over it for BBQ or place a wok on it for that high temp stir fry cooking you can only get at that high heat and constant tossing.

What hibachi really is to a Japanese person is a brazier that hold burning coals for heating water for tea or just heating the room.

Look it up on Wikipedia, it's rather fascinating how the names of so many Japanese things have all been shifted around to market to America.

In commercial restaurant supplies, this is called a wok burner or wok stove.


Why use yeast instead of baking powder? Both yeast and baking powder are used to gas-fill the pastry, make it expand and thus make it soft and fluffy.

Using yeast is rather inconvenient - it can be dead already or if the yeast is submerged in too hot water it can die and also waiting for yeast to work to let it gas-fill the pastry before baking is also not that convenient. Looks like the baking powder is more convenient - it can be stored for ages, can be mixed with hot water, baking can be started immediately after mixing the pastry.

Why is yeast used then? What are those advantages of yeast tham make people use yeast and not the baking powder?

Baking powder, especially if too great a quantity is used, adds an unpleasant flavor to a baked good.  Even in an appropriate quantity it can be noticeable and it certainly doesn't do anything to enhance the flavor.  Many baked goods traditionally don't use a chemical leavener at all, but instead rely on technique.  Creaming butter and sugar together or whipping egg whites was historically used to make cakes which rose solely based on the bubble network that was created.

Yeast, on the other hand, creates a delightful flavor that you associate with your favorite crusty loaf of bread.  Yeast can be used not only in making bread but also in some excellent cakes (St. Louis Gooey Butter Cake, for example, although many "knock off" recipes cheat here and miss out on the true goodness).  Yeast also provides a significantly different texture during the rising due to the intentional creation of a gluten network (usually something you absolutely don't want in a quick bread or quick cake) — you don't get a crumb with big, airy holes from baking powder or baking soda with an acid.

Also, in my experience baking powder lasts six months in the pantry and yeast lasts at least six months in the fridge.  The shelf life is not so different.

If yeast scares you, you may want to check out some of the proponents of the no-knead bread technique.

For a lot more information on this subject, there is a recent publication that covers all sorts of leavening agents.

because yeast if added more will not spoil but baking soda will spoil


What to do with left over rejuvelac grains I have been making rejuvelac from wheat berries in order to make vegan cheese. After I am through with the rejuvelac, I have been throwing away the wheat berries. I tried to find something else I could do with them. The only things I saw were to grow wheat grass or dehydrate them.

I don't wish to grow wheat grass and do not have a dehydrator.

Is there anything else I could do?

I love croutons in my salad, but I don't want to use refined flour products. I mix sprouted grains with a cashew cream blend, add some miso, kimchi, veggie mix left from my juicer, nutritional yeast flakes and herbs, mix it all together and dehydrate at under 104 degrees for a day, flip it over to dh another day and then crumble it up in a zip lock bag with a food grade desiccant packet.  The chunks make awesome croutons!

Discard or compost them in a legal manner


Shelf life and preservation of Bánh chưng It's Tết again and I'm about to buy this traditional Vietnamese delicacy. However, since I'm currently trying out a Joylent-only diet, I'll only be able to eat it after a couple of days.

So my questions are:

How long can I safely store Bánh chưng in the fridge?
Can I preserve it somehow? I've heard that some people boil or freeze it.

Edit: I was able to find some information on Wikipedia, which says the following:

After unwrapping, bánh chưng can stay good for several days while a wrapped one can be kept for two weeks.

Unfortunately, the source is not available online, so I cannot verify its reliability and context. This also contradicts some posts on online forums, where people said it can last even several months! Given the composition and moistness of Bánh chưng, I seriously doubt it.

Edit 2: My second piece of bánh chưng is now safely waiting in the freezer. I'll edit the question again when I eat it with details about its composition and taste after unfreezing it.

How long can I safely store Bánh chưng in the fridge?

It depends on how good the bánh chưng was wrapped (before cooking) and if the bánh chưng is put into the fridge right after cooking and if the bánh chưng is already cut open.
i assume that you have a halfway eaten bánh chưng. I would treat this case like regular cooked rice. A post on cooking.SE says that cooked dishes last 3-4 days in the fridge. StillTasty says 4-6 days. I just asked my mother. She said it will be fine for one week in the fridge if cut. You may have a look at the comments on the question "How long can I store cooked rice in the refrigerator?"

  Can I preserve it somehow? I've heard that some people boil or freeze it.

Boiling would kill some pathogens. But since the toxins produced by the previously existing pathogens won't be destroyed, the bánh chưng would be still unsafe.

Freezing: I'm a student and hoard such stuff in my freezer :D Regarding food safety freezing is not problem. If you store the bánh for too long and/or don't wrap the pieces tightly enough the bánh will have freezer burn. I ate frozen bánh chưng which has been for more than a half year in the freezer. It tasted fine after steaming.
After defrosting you should either recook the bánh or steam it. I think you already knew this ;)

  After unwrapping, bánh chưng can stay good for several days while a
  wrapped one can be kept for two weeks.

I think this statement sound quite plausible if the bánh chưng was wrapped very tightly and was wrapped in many layers statement and is stored in a fridge right after cooking. Bonus: The bánh was cooked in a pressure cooker. I guess, it's even sterile for some time o.o

  some posts on
  online forums, where people said it can last even several months!

I doubt it, too. Did they really said "fridge", not "freezer"? o.o
(Oh, or their bánh chưng drowned in lard. Lard lasts for a very long time x))

I believe 3-4 days max. Be sure to do the smell and taste test also. Sometimes these kinds of foods are not time-able.


what muscles should be present in a ny strip steak? I was delivered some NY steaks, but they don't look like what I'm used to. Usually the NY seems to have one muscle, but these seem to have another muscle (highlighted in yellow). Would these still be considered NY? Any info is greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Yes, it is a NY strip. The "strip loin" is like two feet+ long and at least 3/4 of it is what you're used to seeing. The last four or so steaks include an additional muscle or two at the "top." You got those last few steaks. (SOURCE: I'm a butcher ;)

It looks like the brisket I buy to cut into steaks. I buy the brisket for about $2.50/lb. The meat is tough, but I baste the heck out of it to make it chewable.


Eating mangoes with skin intact I grew up in a family where we had mangoes with the skin intact in fruit salad.

After I got married, I was exposed to the "fact" that "nobody" eats the skin of mangoes.

It is true that I have never seen anyone else besides my childhood family eat mangoes, which would explain why I have no idea that you would not eat the skin of mangoes.

Perhaps, my childhood was too impoverished that we even ate the skin of mangoes. Perhaps, eating skin of mangoes is not an unusual practice, I don't know.

A reason that seems valid is that there is too much chemicals on the skin. But then we would have to say that about strawberries, peaches, apples, wouldn't we?

And what about people in India, China, Japan, Germany, Indonesia or Brazil? Do they eat mangoes with the skin?

It seems such a waste not eating the skin.

Q1. Is it unusual to eat the skin of mangoes, unusual to include mango skin in fruit salads?

Q2. Does mango skin have more chemicals than the skin of other fruits, which we have to eat with their skin intact.

It's not about chemicals on the outside of the fruit; washing the fruit well should take care of that. Whether we eat the skin of any given fruit basically boils down to whether it a) tastes good and b) has a pleasant texture. For example, some people eat the skin of the kiwi, despite it having a hairy texture that many people find unpleasant. Many people do not eat the skins of mango because it tastes bitter and has a tough, fibrous texture, but if you don't mind the texture and enjoy that taste, go ahead, enjoy :)

Note: I'm seeing sources that say if you're particularly sensitive to poison oak, you should not eat mango skins, as they contain one of the chemicals in poison oak but in a much lesser quantity, so it might cause an allergic reaction. You'll probably also break out from touching the mango skin to peel it, so take that as a warning sign. This doesn't apply to the OP, since if you've been eating them all your life you're obviously not allergic, but might apply to other people googling this question.

I have found some answers online.

Eating mango skin is good for you:

http://www.dirtdoctor.com/organic/garden/view_org_research/id/105/

Only eat the skin if the mango is organic:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4L3FJk9LNLI

Let me repeat the comments I made to Yamikuronue's answer:

I have never encountered anyone who had such allergy.
There is so far only one single research on this subject, and the same "research" has been referenced by every page attempting to document the subject, all over the internet.
I'm afraid it could be simply like the doctor who fraudulently attributed autism to vaccination, which then everyone virally referenced his unverified "research" until some common-sensed people decided to verify his claims.
Some people prefer calling it a peel. No, it's banana peel but mango skin.
Wash the mango skin using fruit/veggie detergent or baking soda to wipe the pesticides and whatever-cides before they cutting the mango.
Especially the ones you bought straight from the orchard.
Mango skin has a layer of sticky oil that retains such chemicals well. Some people are hyper-sensitive to the pesticides and chemicals retained on the mango skin.
A lady who had eaten mangoes all her life blogged that when she ate the mango with its skin intact from an orchard in FL, her lips started swell, and attributed it to the mythical presence of urushiol, she had just read.
Wouldn't the "urushiol" could simply have easily merged into the cutting board too?

I am not saying that the presence of urushiol on mango skin is not a possibility. I am saying there is only one single "research" which so far has not been verified by any other, and therefore the presence of urushiol on mango skin should be considered mythical, or otherwise anecdotal.

How is it possible that of so many people around me who are sensitive to poison ivy, there is not a single incidence of sensitivity to touching mango skin ???
How is it possible that people could eat mangoes and that the urushiol could not have slipped and absorbed into the flesh, while slicing the mango ???


How to make mayonnaise with a cooked yolk? I have heard of mayonnaise made with cooked yolks before, but was suspicious of it. Now a user posted another question with a link to a recipe which shows the making steps. It shows the making a mayonnaise with a hard boiled yolk, emulsifying 150 ml of oil with a single yolk (and as far as I can tell, no additional liquid - the text is in Romanian). The mayonnaise in the picture looks nicely emulsified and smooth.

How is boiled-yolk-mayo made? What is the best ratio? Should I follow a different method than with raw yolk? How different is the result from normal mayonnaise?

Regarding Romanian recipe...

Actually in Romania people tend not to use raw yolks so much. Most often we eat relatively raw yolks just in fried eggs or soft boiled eggs.
In most of recipes the yolks are cooked.

Regarding mayonnaise there are three ways of preparing it: using just raw yolks (most simple), using raw and cooked yolks 50-50, and using just cooked yolks (harder).

For the last one, which helps storing mayonnaise safer and longer,  the eggs are well boiled and then the yolk is removed. After cooling done until lukewarm it is finely crushed (often by passing it through a sieve several times) and then oil is added little by little. Sometime a small quantity of soft mustard is added for creating more chance of success. For one yolk about 100 ml oil can be incorporated (depending yolk size, as well). The mayo resulting it is slight harder then regular one. For making it softer, if you would like, you can add at last bubbled water (like a teaspoon), some lemon juice and even a tablespoon of cream or yogurt. Enjoy! Pofta buna!!

PS: we have some recipes of mayo without yolks, at all. These are for the period when we traditionally fast and no animal product is allowed.

Look up sauce gribiche,  If you leave out the pickle juice and use hard boiled egg, oil, lemon juice and mustard you have mayo.


separating almond flour from almond meal I've been experimenting with almond flour for baking bread because I have a hard time digesting starches.  I've progressed to the point where my bread made from 50:50 (almond:wheat flours) is almost indistinguishable from 100% wheat flour.  That's a big win for me.

Almond Meal is not Almond Flour

The problem is that I have yet to find anyone actually selling actual almond flour.  Most vendors only sell almond meal even though they like to call it "almond flour".  Some vendors sell "fine ground almond flour" which is still just fine ground almond meal (I'm lookin' at you Bob's Red Mill).  Semantics aside, I have found that the fat content of almond products I can buy is too high and the texture too gritty to make good bread dough.

Making Almond Flour from Almond Meal

I've had great success separating the oily and gritty parts of almond meal from the almond flour.  With the right pitch of sieve you end up with surprisingly smooth and dry flour and a yield of between 65% and 80%.

I'm fine with the yield.  The sifting process, however, is terribly slow.  Making 50 grams of flour with a plain-old dome-shaped sieve takes about 5 minutes of labour.  That's just too time consuming to become a regular part of my meals.

Is there a better way?

Is there a method or device that will separate more flour from almond meal with less manual labour?
Is there some source of actual almond flour hidden away by food distributors somewhere?

Note: I am perfectly tolerant of gluten.  I am also tolerant to minimal amounts of starches over time.  Please keep that in mind if you are inclined to suggest alternative strategies.

Any good hardware store will sell screen in a variety of mesh sizes.
Pick one out that matches your dome-sieve, and buy a couple square feet.
Make a wooden frame with say six inch sides, and tack the screen solidly to the bottom.
Sieve into a clean dishpan. Your sifting rate will increase substantially over what you're getting now.

For really fine flour, head to the fabric store, or buy a pair of nylons, and frame as I've already described.

Buy the almond flour from Safeway goes through my sift like confectioners' sugar. I do this thing where I keep my almond flour in the freezer; i feel like it prevents the almonds from turning into an oily paste if you need to keep processing it because of the bigger chunks.


Can you brine frozen meat? I want to brine a frozen chicken but I'm unsure if there is any reason why brining frozen meat is bad?

Can you brine frozen meat, or do you first have to defrost it before you can brine it, or does it not matter?

No, you can't.  Or at least, you won't get the result you're really looking for.

Water needs to be able to move through the meat for the salt and flavorings to be transported to the inner cells of the meat.  When the meat's frozen, you're dealing with ice crystals.

... that being said, you can thaw the meat in the brine if you're desperate, but you have less control to know exactly how much salt will be absorbed.  (and I vaguely remember another question on here about temperature & brining, and I seem to recall someone reported on experimental results that really cold brines didn't transfer flavors deeply into the meat.).

Yes, actually you can. Quite a few cooks will tell you it's very possible. I've done it,  and it turns out great.

"Make sure your brine
is no warmer than cool room temperature, then place your frozen meat
in the brine. Place the whole thing in the refrigerator, and check on
it after an hour — if the meat is thawed, then you can remove it from
the brine and proceed with cooking. If it’s still frozen in the
middle, put it back in the refrigerator until it is completely thawed.
When I did this with a very thick bone-in pork chop, it took about 1
1/2 hours to thaw and brine."

Source:
https://www.thekitchn.com/did-you-know-you-can-thaw-and-brine-meat-at-the-same-time-tips-from-the-kitchn-216723


Substitute for Kirsch in Leckerli (Basel Lackerli) cookies? With the U.S. holiday season soon upon us, I've been anxious to start making my annual batches of Leckerli cookies (a Swiss cookie, flavored with cloves and candied citrus!).

However, disaster has struck. I am out of Kirsch, and can't find another bottle locally! I think I bought the original in Boston, when I lived there... but rural Maine doesn't offer the same grocery opportunities.

So, my question is, does anyone know of a reasonable substitute for Kirsch? It's basically a cherry liqueur, just not sweet like a liqueur. "Cherry brandy" might be a better description.

I would use any uncolored brandy made from distilled fruit. Himbeergeist, sliwowitz, or what you can lay your hands on.

Kirsch doesn't taste much like cherries, and I suspect that it functions more as a solvent for some of the aroma in the spices than for adding its own taste. Even though it does contribute a bit, the taste will be subtle, and other slight fruity notes from a different fruit brandy will blend with the heavy spices just as well.

In a pinch, you could use a colored brandy too, like Chantre. But it will add more of its own flavor, and while it can make a good combination, it will be further from the original than a random obstwasser.

I would avoid any liqueurs, they will add way too much foreign taste, and also won't have enough alcohol to solve the spices in the same way.

the closest thing to Kirsch is domestic Moonshine.


Can evaporated milk be converted to sweetened condensed? (Not a duplicate of this question, I don't believe)

If I have a recipe that calls for sweetened condensed milk but only have a can of evaporated milk, is there anything I can do to it to the evaporated milk to make it a suitable replacement for sweetened condensed milk?  Does the heating / sterilizing of evaporated milk ruin it as a replacement?

You may convert evaporated milk into condensed milk by adding sugar to it. For each cup of  evaporated milk add about 1 and 1/4 cups of sugar.  Pour the mixture in a pan, stir while heating on the stovetop until the sugar completely dissolves.  Let cool.  The heating of evaporated milk is similar to the treatment condensed milk undergoes, so the evaporated milk with sugar should be a perfect replacement.

I would add sugar and heat it up until dissolved.


Should parboiled rice be washed/rinsed before cooking? Should parboiled rice be washed or rinsed before cooking? If yes, on average how many times it should be washed. Should it be rinsed in water for more than 10 minutes?

Par boiled should not be rinsed, it is ready to be cooked as-is.

It was already rinsed and cleaned and, erm, par boiled.

If unsure, check the instruction on the package.

All rice should be washed and rinsed unless you are using it to make Risotto.


Raw meat or prepared food? Which lasts longer? - Short term Let's say you buy all the ingredients for your meal. You choose a recipe which is using meat.
From the shop, you get raw grinded meat that is still good for a week. (label says so.)

Which will last longer?
A) The raw meat in the fridge (and prepare it when you want it.)
B) Prepare the meal, cool it down properly and put it in the fridge.
C) Freeze the meat and unthaw when you need it the next few days.

(C is an extra option, as I doubt it's a handy option if you just want to prepare the meal the next day or the day after that. But again, I couldn't find any evidence back anything up.)

Option C lasts longest, then option A, with option B being the shortest.

When you have no other information, the official fridge life of any cooked meal is 3-5 days, starting from the day you cooked it, and no matter how old or fresh the ingredients were.

When you have information from the producer, as in the case of your label, then this information supplants any standard assumptions. So your raw meat will last for a full week, assuming you cook it all at once. This is longer than the 3-5 days.

The information on the label assumes that the package stays closed. The moment you open it, the date on the label becomes irrelevant, and you are left with the typical fridge life of ground meat, which is 1-2 days. So you cannot cook small portions every day for a week.

Freezing "stops the clock" on shelf life, so it lasts as long as you want it to.

The answer about "This helps to kill bacteria which will otherwise make the meat go bad." is based on oversimplified reasoning which is not in line with food safety standars. For more info on this and other typical myths, see https://cooking.stackexchange.com/tags/food-safety/info.

Prepared meat will last longer, if ...

you grind in naturally preserving condiments like oregano, sesame oil, vinegar.

As wells as natural anti-bacterials like salt, sugar, honey.

Sugar oxidation, at low temperatures that do not encourage fermentation, discourages bacterial activity.

However, if you grind in rapidly spoiling food like vegetables and fruits, (e.g. some people like to grind cilantro and scallions into their meat) .... I have no idea what would happen.

But don't you think that grinding the meat in naturally preserving condiments and natural anti-bacterials and then cooking it to kill all the bacteria would make it last longer? OTOH, cooking it changes the mechanisms of food degradation. Any self-respecting chef would recommend against freezing cooked food for storage. Not even for a day.

I think it is best to freeze it after preservative grinding without cooking it would be the best.


Liquid made with cream and penicillium roqueforti? In a comment on this answer, Wayfaring Stranger mentions something I'd never heard of before:

  Incubating a walnut size chunk of blue with some cream for a couple days creates a lovely tasty thick blue liquid. The stuff has a fancy French name, but it's been too many years since I actually saw the recipe.

What is this? How is it used? Obviously cultures of penicillium roqueforti like the original blue cheese are safe when made correctly, but is this safe to make in a home kitchen? Are there any potential pitfalls to be aware of?

I honestly doubt that growing blue mould in cream for a few days will have much effect, but why not try, it won't harm you either.

Why is it not going to work? Mould needs oxygen to grow. When making blue cheese (or generally cheese with "internal" mould), holes are punched through the curd to create air channels to supply the mould with oxygen. A Wikipedia image of Gorgonzola clearly shows how the mould grows around one of these punch holes. You can also see how the mould only grows around other natural cracks in the curd, while there are large solid areas of cheese with no visible sign of mould at all.

If you don't do this and the curd is without naturals cracks, the mould will only grow on the cheese surface, like for example on a Camembert.

If you soak a piece of blue cheese in cream, some spores may of course dissolve and reach the surface, but they will only be able to grow on the cream's surface. Another problem is that Penicillium roqueforti is not growing particularly fast. Roquefort is for example ripened at least four months under ideal conditions, so just a few days will not allow much growth.

Why is it not going to harm you? Using harmless or perhaps even beneficial moulds like Penicillium roqueforti to prepare food is not only done for the taste, but also for their preserving functions. Or more precisely, different species of mould tend to fight each other, so seeding food with a "good" mould will prevent the growth of "bad" mould. Anyway, cream will get sour and taste bad long before dangerous amounts of mould would grow.

When mould grows on your food, it often gives the food a flavour you don't like.

Mostly, that flavour is making a statement. The mould is saying "this is my food, not yours".
You could eat it, despite the "off flavour" - but people avoid taking chances -if it comes down to "can I eat this and live happily", they are mostly wrong.

People don't want to take that chance - and the mould is allowed to eat that food, not the huming beans. You could mainly still eat the food, the flavour is "off-putting".

NOW those of us with edificated palates are quite used to the flavors that penicillin moulds can give to cheese. If you have "cheese moulds" you could get them to grow on anything coming from a dairy - with the result that you have something that tastes of "blue cheese", as opposed to generally "mouldy".

Don't let that tiny fungal organism tell you what to do because it can influence your odoriforous sensibilities ...


What ingredients will allow me to make a foam with a whipped cream charger? So I have an iSi whipped cream charger. There are a series of recipes that sound really interesting, but I don't quite understand what ingredients you need in order to make a stable foam / mousse. Some common ingredients seem to be cheese, cream, and gelatin. But I've also seen recipes with chocolate and water (melted and combined), lecithin, or even scrambled eggs with sous vide eggs, skim milk, and butter.

So what ingredients are a must for making a foam? How do they work?

I must admit, I'm more interested in the "how" than the "what". The what seems to be pretty well defined in the list or recipes, but I want to be able to create my own culinary treats and understanding the process is invaluable in making things up.

A foam is just a liquid with plenty of air incorporated into it.  You can incorporate air into any liquid; in order to be able to create an actual foam, however, you need to be able to incorporate the air faster than it escapes.

What makes a liquid able to hold the air you're incorporating (and hence form a foam) is a foam stabilizer, also commonly called an emulsifier1.  I know of no specific taxonomy of stabilizers, but the vast majority are hydrocolloids AKA gelling agents and belong to some family of protein.

Agar, carrageenan, alginate, xanthan, and pectin are all types of polysaccharide;
Lecithin is mostly a random collection of phospholipids;
Gelatin is denatured collagen, i.e. animal protein;
Whey protein is the prevalent protein in dairy products;

And so on.  Really almost any emulsifier will do.  Basically everything in your list either is, or contains, one of the the additives mentioned above:

Chocolate is almost always emulsified with soy lecithin;
Eggs contain high amounts of lecithin;
Milk and cream contain whey protein;
Most "supermarket cream" also has emulsifiers like carrageenan already in it.

...you get the picture, I hope.  The most basic answer I can give to this is that if you want to make a foam, you need to either use something that's already an emulsion (milk, butter, chocolate, etc.) or use an emulsifier/stabilizer additive (such as gelatin, lecithin, etc.)

If you want a relatively complete list of all of the food additives that qualify, you'll want to look at the E number, and specifically E400-499 (thickeners, stabilizers, emulsifiers).

1. As commenter Erik very correctly points out, an emulsifier is not the same thing as a foam stabilizer.  However, by convention, the terms seem to be used interchangeably all over the place, to the extent that I get blank looks when I refer to a "stabilizer" as opposed to "emulsifier".  So, know the difference, but don't get too hung up on it.

There are many, many methods to making a mousse.  From simply folding melted chocolate into cream, to making a ganache and then folding that in, to making italian meringue and folding that in.......Normally, it is always something folded into a whipped cream.

My favourite way to make a supple, nice, flavourful mousse is to prepare a bombe, and fold that in.


Is it okay to eat fish with an isopod parasite on it? I bought some frozen Hairtail fish (Chinese: 帶魚) and one of them had some kind of isopod on it. I already removed the bug and threw it out, but after some research it looks a lot like the image here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cymothoidae
Is it still okay to cook and eat the fish?

I'd say no.
Conventional wisdom suggest that when in doubt, throw it.
Throw it away, go back to your fishmonger/store and tell them about that.
If that fails, do not buy from that brand (if there's any brands attached to your frozen fish)

Fish is such food that causes food poisoning quickly. And if you see something there, like isopods, or the colour is not okay, or it smells strange, it's better to through it away. Even if you cook it it doesn't guarantee you safety.


Why should I soak beans before cooking? Every recipe says I should soak beans in water overnight before cooking. Why?

I did some experiments. I have tried soaked and unsoaked beans from the same batch. There was no difference in cooking time, taste, structure or color. Even farts were the same!

Also, one time I read an interview with a cook that makes famous bean soup and he confirmed my findings. He said that he also experimented and he doesn't find a difference.

So what is the reason for soaking beans before cooking? What does it change?

One reason is to remove some of the indigestible complex sugars that cause gas.

Another reason is that beans are dirty, so you're just cleaning them with the soaking. If the recipe wants the beans to be cooked in the water used for soaking, the washing needs to be done before the soaking.

On top of that the soaking can reduce cooking time considerably, which might be the biggest advantage.

Soaking beans for at least 12 hrs is essential in order to remove the anti-nutrients such as phytic acid and to make them more digestible. You must discard the soaking water, it is dirty and contains all the anti-nutrients. Cover the beans with filtered water and add 2 tablespoons of raw apple cider vinegar such as Bragg's. Soak for at least 12 to 24 hrs.


What type of yoghurt should I use for making curry? I've seen a lot of recipes specifying "yoghurt" when making an indian-style curry, but very rarely do they specify what type.

The problem is compounded for me in that I live in a country where I don't speak the native language, and their concept of what may or may not be yoghurt is possibly different from mine.

Is turkish yoghurt okay? Or should I look for something else? Or does it not even matter?

For reference, I'm intending to make a chicken korma or something along those lines.

Edit: I live in Sweden.

I think for Indian recipes you should in general look for an unstrained, set yoghurt. There are other factors that determine the final taste and texture of the yoghurt (the bacteria, the type of milk, length of fermentation, …) but you may not have much choice w.r.t. other factors than these two:

Production process: Set yoghurt is yoghurt that's made the traditional way, it's fermented in the pot that it's sold in. Stirred yoghurt on the other hand is fermented before being packaged; it's a more industrialized production process which is cheaper, but results in a more sour, thinner yoghurt. Stirred yoghurt has a smooth, pourable consistency; whereas set yoghurt is firmer. I got a bit confused when I was using stirred yoghurt the first time I tried making raita and the recipe told me to whisk the yoghurt till it was smooth. The pretty sour taste of the yoghurt also didn't go well with the spices, and the juice from the cucumbers made the already-thin yoghurt too watery. You could try fixing both problems by straining the yoghurt a bit and adding sugar, but it's better and easier to just buy set yoghurt. The yoghurt's packaging might say explicitly what type of yoghurt it is, but if it doesn't or you don't understand the language: avoid yoghurt that comes in “milk carton”-like containers, that most definitely means it's stirred yoghurt. A plastic pot doesn't mean it's set yoghurt though, but it's a better bet.

Thickness: Strained yoghurt (like “Greek-style yoghurt” in Europe and the USA) is yoghurt from which the whey has been removed. It's pretty thick and sometimes also referred to as “yoghurt cheese.” In India it's used for example in the dessert Shrikhand, but if a recipe doesn't specify that you should strain the yoghurt, you should assume it's unstrained or briefly strained. Wikipedia says: “In south Asia, regular unstrained yoghurt (dahi), made from cow or water buffalo milk, is often sold in disposable clay pots. Kept for a couple of hours in its clay pot, some of the water evaporates through the clay's pores. But true strained yoghurt (chakka) is made by draining dahi in a cloth.” Should you really only find strained yoghurt, you can probably just thin it back with water or milk.

I should maybe add I don't have first-hand experience with what yoghurt from India tastes like, but I've observed that the ethnic shops in my area and one Indian take-away where I could peer into the kitchen all sell/use the exact same brand of yoghurt, which is an unstrained, set yoghurt with a mild (not too sour) taste.


omelettes and scrambled eggs - How long can I store them? Is it a good idea to keep make a lot of them and keep them in the refrigerator? I like them for breakfast but I don't like cooking every morning. For how long I can keep them?

What Tim said. Eggs just don't hold very well, and they are very sensitive to temperature--reheating them basically will mean re-cooking them. I would never store eggs in this manner, because the texture and flavour degradation will make them unpleasant to eat.

However, to actually answer your question--and again, I urge you not to do this because stored and reheated eggs will taste like garbage--cooked eggs should keep for up to 72 hours in the refrigerator. Remember to chill them as rapidly as possible after cooking, and you may wish to undercook slightly in order to minimize problems when reheating.

I would use 72 hours as an absolute maximum, particularly if you are undercooking. 48 hours is probably wiser.

I've heard Sanitary wise they are good for a week, but my experience is after about 3-4 days they tend to give you the runs, soo I wouldn't make more than enough for 3 or 4 days.


How do you properly cook a steak? I love steaks so much, that I would like to get a green card and live in the States just to enjoy good steaks whenever I want.

When I try to cook a steak at home (I live in Italy), it always turns out burned outside and almost totally raw inside. Actually only a thin layer is cooked (or I should say carbonized).

If I try to lower the temperature of the grill pan, I get an extremely dried meat that resembles cork.

So, which are the basics for properly cooking a steak (say, to a medium-well grade)?

You can use the rule of thumb method to measure the "doneness" of the steak:

You loosely touch one of your fingers with your thumb depending on how well done you want it, and the tension of the muscle of your hand below the thumb will be the same as how the meat should feel when you press it.

Turn your heat down and leave it on the grill longer.


Beef: Red on the outside, brown on the inside Take bright-red ground beef and put it in a freezer for a few days.  After
taking it out and letting it thaw, it looks fairly red on the outside, but brown
on the inside. Why is that?

From the answers to this question,
I understand that fresh beef initially becomes bright-red upon exposure to oxygen, and
then browns after long-exposure to oxygen.

I also understand that oxygen can pass through the plastic packaging.

What I don't understand is why the the ground beef on the inside turns brown
before the outside? If oxygen is the cause of browning, shouldn't the opposite happen?

The meat is brown on the inside not due to too much oxygen but due to a lack of oxygen.
Oxygen can pass through the packaging but not, generally, through the meat itself.  Thus, the interior of the meat runs out of oxygen faster than the exterior (which is still exposed to oxygen from the air) and browns for this reason.
I'll quote the full-explanation from the USDA, just for reference:

Why is pre-packaged ground beef red on the outside and sometimes dull, grayish-brown inside?
Oxygen from the air reacts with meat pigments to form a bright red color which is usually seen on the surface of meat purchased in the supermarket. The pigment responsible for the red color in meat is oxymyoglobin, a substance found in all warm-blooded animals. Fresh cut meat is purplish in color. The interior of the meat may be grayish brown due to lack of oxygen; however, if all the meat in the package has turned gray or brown, it may be beginning to spoil.

This is an old trick by the meat department at large grocery stores. They often take the meat that was prepacked and browning and grind it. It is now browning ground beef. they then take the not so pretty meat and place it outside of the view of the purchaser. This is a great way to keep food costs down as nobody would likely by brown hamburger meat. Meat does not brown from the inside out but
the outside in.


My induction stove does not evenly heat a frying pan. Is it broken or am I doing something wrong? I have used a Kenmore Elite induction stove after moving about 6 months ago from a gas range and it has many good qualities but no matter what I try I can't get it to heat evenly when frying food. Like when I try to sear a steak  with some olive oil or stir fry something the pan ends up with a hot spot in the middle and a cool outer rim. This applies not only when heating up the pan but also in the middle of cooking it maintains this problem. This happens no matter which heating circle I use. I have tried cast iron, steel, induction element pans of various sizes, and yes they are flat,and always have this problem.  I desperately need advice at this stage.

What I would do is invest in a $30 - $50 single induction hob that can be put on your counter, and see if the problem persists there. At the worst case, you just have an extra hob for stocks or something, but it could very well be that you'll have some success there, which gives you a hob that you could use for searing and such. It helps you to eliminate the range itself as the culprit.

The other thing you could do (again, any action here is going to cost money) is invest in some 3 or even 5 ply cookware from a vendor like All Clad. They have steel / copper / steel / aluminum / steel 'sandwich' pans that are tested to conduct heat perfectly evenly.

Given what you've tried, I tend to think the range itself is the culprit. Some induction ranges (especially earlier ones) just didn't perform very well for cooks that ventured beyond basic boiling and frying. This is why getting an extra hob might be the best course you could take.

If it is the range itself then high-tech / high-performance layered cookware is going to probably help a little, but it's not going to fix the fact that the rings aren't functional comparable to the dispersion of a flame (which modern hobs can mostly claim, even the cheaper ones).

While cast iron isn't guaranteed to be an even conductor and can have its issues, those issues shouldn't be nearly as bad as what you're seeing, which strongly points at the range itself as the likely culprit.

Good luck, unfortunately this is one of those problems that requires a little spending to figure out.

Cast iron and stainless steel are both poor conductors of heat, if the pans are not thick enough you will get hot and cold zones, I think you should aim for something with aluminum in it(maybe the stainless-aluminum-stainless type) and try to go for a thicker pan.

That is just my general knowledge, I didn't try induction ovens before.

edit: ignore what I said about aluminum, as JAB pointed out aluminum doesn't work with induction


How to make yogurt without any existing yogurt How does one make yogurt when there isn't any existing yogurt to use as a starter?

There are various bacteria that can make yogurt. They ferment milk at warm temperatures and are called "thermophilic" for that reason.

These bacteria were cultivated by millenia ago. I assume by having milk accidentally spoil to something that didn't kill the starving person who ate it.

Tasty thermophilic lactobacilli do exist in the wild but so do plenty of other very untasty bacteria that would love to eat the lactose in your warm milk. You can't just let warm milk spoil and hope you get yogurt bacteria. The only way to be sure is to not get sick when you eat it.

Getting yogurt starters is very easy.

Any yogurt from the store that contains "live active cultures" can be used as a starter. Yogurt starters can also be purchased dried online.

Once you have some yogurt, and won't be making more for a long time, you can save a little dried or in the freezer.

just pour the milk to the jar and seal it airtightly ,loose the seal after 12 hours ,you need to warm the milk first before pouring it to the jar ,you dont need starter at all ,you just need the milk alone .

i dont make this with starter of any kind just only milk  but i cant upload the pic to this site i dont know why :(


Omelette cooked in oven or pan? What differences are, besides speed, when cooking omelettes in oven versus in the frying pan?

I have traditionally always used pan but i see now some recipes recommend oven.

Just because the recipe calls it an "omelette" doesn't make it one. An omelette starts and ends its cooking in a pan. If you finish it in the oven, it becomes a frittata. (There are a couple of historic differences, but let's just stick with that.) If the egg mixture both starts and finishes in the oven it would probably be a crust-less quiche.

The benefits of cooking in the oven is the ability to get more even cooking of the eggs to get a more consistent texture throughout.

Speed, yes, but cooking in the oven will also cook the omelette more consistently all the way through.

Consider pan frying chicken; the outside cooks much faster than the inside.  It will also possibly dry out the ingredients more than pan frying, making the finished product less runny.


UK alternative to corn syrup? I've noticed that often when using recipes from the US that corn syrup is called for, and I was wondering what the best alternative to it would be to get in the UK?

I've heard some people saying that golden syrup is comparable, but when using it in cooking (particularly baking) it always seems to give a sticky / stodgy texture that I don't think is meant to be there?

Any ideas?

As far as I understand the basic chemistry, golden syrup should do well for you.

A different option is to dissolve a lot of sugar in some hot water and then to slowly reduce it to the right consistency, which should be more or less identical to corn syrup.

1.25c (296ml) sugar dissolved in 0.25c (59ml) hot water is equivalent to Light Corn Syrup.


Ideal coffee grind for a French Press? I recently picked up this Bodum "French Press" style coffee maker and so far, I'm really enjoying it for its simplicity. But I'm curious how I should be grinding my coffee.

When I bought it, I grabbed a bag of pre-ground coffee at the grocery store and this worked well. But recently, I bought a can of beans and put it thru the coffee grinder at the store and I may have chose too coarse a grind as I seem to be getting very weak cups of coffee now.

The manual said pick a "coarse" grind, so it turned the dial all the way to the left labeled "coarse". I'm thinking it should have been somewhere in the middle, like "Percolate".

Any advice on the optimal grind?

EDIT: Also, What ratio of Tbsp to oz of water? (or grams to ml, if you prefer metric.)

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

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

The picture is from this article.

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

I must add to this thread.

Problems with other posts...letting your coffee sit for a long time is NOT a good option if you like hot coffee.  Trying to get more flavor by sitting longer is a fail unless you like your coffee only warm.

Fine grinds getting through the filter is not so much a problem nor is the pushing pressure.  Get used to grinding your coffee just they way that allows for a firm pressure to squeeze the water through the grinds.  I know that with my grinder, it is a 10 count to get the grind just right every day using the typical handheld spinning blade grinder.

If you are worried about getting bitter flavors and like a robust flavor, do what I do...
-Water from kettle just before boil begins (the loud bubbling becomes quite, but not a full boil)
-Immediately pour the water into the press with the grounds in it already
-If you use enough beans (I like it strong and perhaps use more beans than most), you can press immediately.  Think about it. Typical coffee makers just pass water straight through the grinds without soaking for a long time.
-Press the grinds and then immediately pour coffee into mug and carafe to keep hot.  Afraid of grinds that may have passed through the filter...well then, use a paper filter to pour your coffee through to catch anything so small.

Done.  Strong, good tasting coffee, ground simply and fairly fine.  Not bitter. Not Cold.


No oil on non-stick pans? My boyfriend is convinced that a non-stick coating on a pan (Teflon, seasoned cast iron, eco-ceramic, what have you) is equivalent to eliminating the need for using any cooking oil whatsoever.

Is this in fact the case? I'm fairly sure that it only reduces the amount of oil necessary to keep things from sticking, but I'm having a hard time proving this (other than the empirical tests that keep failing). Essentially, he is a huge fan of fried eggs, but is trying to avoid the eventual heart attacks.

There are two parts to this question, the stated part, and the unstated "are you really frying an egg if there is no oil?"

For the first part, most manufacturers of non-stick pans claim that their product makes oil unnecessary, and generally I've found that to be true. A little oil helps, but "necessary" might be a stretch.

To maximize your non-stickyness of a non-stick pan, you should always preheat the pan before adding the food, at least to 250F or so. Preheating causes the teflon to expand a bit, closing up pores and micro-scratches in the surface.

It is also common for oils from the past to form a polymerized layer on top of the teflon, making the pan more sticky. This is actually worse when you use aerosol spray oils, because the tiny droplets hit the pan and very quickly polymerize to form a slightly sticky layer. This layer is similar to the one you intentionally create when seasoning a cast iron pan, but in this case it is not helpful. All-Clad recommends periodically cleaning teflon pans with a light scrub of baking soda and water to remove that coating of oil. It should bring back the maximum slippery of your teflon.

When cooking protein-rich foods, you can also minimize sticking by letting the food cook a bit before attempting to move it. The loose, floppy denatured proteins in an egg are extremely sticky, but when they coagulate (set) from cooking, they become less sticky. It may seem impossibly sticky at first, but may release on it's own after a minute of cooking.

As to the second, unstated part, oil provides flavor, and is also a heat-transfer vehicle. When the food is on the pan, if you looked at it with a microscope only a small portion of the food is actually in contact with the pan. Those areas will get heated more, and other areas will get heated less. A little oil fills those gaps, causing more even thermal contact, which allows fried food to fry, rather than just get burned in some areas.

It is really a matter of taste whether the flavor of the oil and the way that it changes the texture of the food is appealing to your boyfriend. I wouldn't like it without any oil, but if he does, well, so be it. If he doesn't really like the taste, but is concerned about health, I'd suggest using a little olive oil - it has no cholesterol, is low in saturated fats, and has a good flavor. Different than butter, but still very enjoyable.

I sell most of the frying pans besides Teflon, ceramic is greener and that one is 60% less oil that you need. You can get many versions of this pan; some of them contain silver ions which are antibacterial. My sister has this one and adds a splash of water but no oil).

I would recommend a marble frying pan; with marble you don't need any oil what-so-ever to cook with it. Nothing sticks and it's easy to clean. No need to scrub, just warm soapy water. I get heaps of people coming to my shop saying they bought the blue ones that they sell at big W and the surface peeled; the ones I sell do not peel.

As for cast iron, this really depends on the type of cast iron. Enamel coated ones still need a bit of oil (depending on what you are cooking). The non coated ones don't need oil but you need to season them (which means placing the pan on medium heat and running oil over it after every use) or it will rust.


Is it better to freeze crepe batter or cooked crepes? I sometimes make crepe pancakes with the following recipe: 200g of flour, 350ml of milk, 2 eggs and a table spoon of vegetable oil.

I was wondering whether it was better to store the crepe batter in the freezer and cook some when I want it, or to cook the crepes then store them in the freezer.

Which way will last longer and which way will ensure that the crepes are fresh when I eat them?

It is a compromise either way.  Neither will be as good as freshly made, but both methods will work.  As far as frozen batter, you will either need to plan ahead, or be willing to wait for it to thaw.  If you go this route, I would suggest zip style freezer bags, and freeze flat, so that it will thaw more quickly.  Also, some of the leavening power will be reduced.  So, if you enjoy fluffy pancakes, you might not be able to achieve that.  On the other hand, frozen pancakes are fine too.  However, you also lose some quality here as well.  The issue is reheating...unless you have a combi-oven, where you can use steam to bring them back to life.  In terms of length of storage, as long as they well packaged, the shelf life is about the same.

I had to really sit & think about this for a while.   When we make food fresh, from scratch, (as opposed to something with enough preservatives to save it for 50 years, eek) like this, as many others mentioned, they are better fresh, and I don't know that either choice will give you a perfectly "fresh" crepe later.
I bake a lot and have never saved batter, but have frozen baked goods and had them still taste pretty good. I am somewhat concerned about saving anything with raw eggs in it.
I think freezing your finished crepes, or making fewer,will give the best and possibly healthier result!


What difference does oxygen content of tea water make? I've heard the advice that water should be boiled for tea only one--that when boiled it loses dissolved oxygen, and if there is insufficient oxygen in the water, the flavor of the tea is (somehow) affected.

This doesn't seem to make sense to me. If the water loses oxygen when it is boiled, it would have lost it before tea ever touched it anyway.

Does this really make a difference, or is it just a commonly perpetuated kitchen myth? If there is one, what affect does the oxygen (or lack) have on the finished product?

All moving water has dissolved oxygen in it. That is what fish breath

Dissolved oxygen is reactive, and will most likely extract more substances from the tea leaf, than without it. If these are the good flavour parts of tea, I do not know?

When you heat water it starts to release the dissolved oxygen. The more you heat water the more oxygen escapes

You can buy tea making kettles that bring water up to 95°C (203°F), but not boiling, so as to decrease the amount of dissolved oxygen lost, but still making the water hot enough to brew tea. They also save energy :-) I use one of these, and am happy with it

Example Kettle

Some people "watch" their kettle, and switch it off just before the water boils!

It is a personal taste preference if tea tastes better when brewed in water with more dissolved oxygen or not

All the correspondents seemed to have mislaid the chemistry and physics from early school lessons
as I remember water is composed of two atoms of Hydrogen and one of oxygen, if one were to remove the oxygen as suggested then to be sure we are left with H2 which at NTP (normal temperature and pressure) occurs as a highly flammable gas, plus you would need a chemical reaction (catalysis) or electrolysis to separate O from H2 , boiling water is simply heating water until the vapour given off equalises atmospheric pressure which is one bar or one atmosphere in old money, as a matter of interest Marks and Spencers have a message on their tea packets that boiling water removes the Oxygen, a case I think for appropriate legislation enforcement.

Tom Gilmore


Is copper cookware really better than stainless steel? This is somewhat related to the question about copper vs. cast iron, but this is about copper vs. pure stainless steel.
I had an old stainless steel stockpot that warped (it was very, very cheap stainless steel, paper thin) and have to replace it ASAP.  I have a family member with a few connections that gets a deep discount on one of the more expensive brands.  I asked her to look into getting me a copper stockpot (lined with stainless steel, of course, so the reactivity problem more or less goes away), and got this response as an explanation to why it is apparently unavailable here:

[...] there is apparently no advantage cooking-wise to using copper, and people just buy it for the look.
[...] None of our big accounts, including [XYZ] etc even had any interest in stocking it, which is why we never brought it in.

Note that these stores do carry the same brand of stainless steel products, just not copper.
Now, I am taking this with a grain pile of salt because (a) this family member never cooks and (b) the advice came from a marketing manager who obviously wants to push the products that are available locally.  Nevertheless, I think it's worth asking people with knowledge/experience:
Is there actual evidence confirming any of the advantages of copper cookware (durability, conductivity, heat spread, etc.)?  Has it actually been proven anywhere that copper is (or is not) superior to stainless steel?
Or are articles like these just parroting a bunch of myths?
I'm looking for strong evidence here, so please answer only if you are prepared to back it up.
Clarification (with apologies to Ward): I am looking for evidence of the practical benefits.  It's obviously indisputable and easy to look up the fact that copper is a better conductor than steel, and lighter; the question is, does this matter with respect to responsiveness, hot spots, and so on?

Modern stainless steel pans with clad bottoms can be as good as copper pans.  McGee developed a simple technique to test the heat distribution where he fits a piece of paper to the bottom of the pan, placing the pan over a burner and carefully watching how the paper browns.  Thick aluminum, clad bottom stainless, and copper all worked equally well.

There are differences that relate to the techniques used in cooking.  A thin copper pan is great for melting butter or chocolate straight on the burner.  Modern air-gap wall stainless steel pans hold the heat better and work better for simmering or boiling.  Copper is harder to upkeep.

Pans will develop hot spots, even copper which is the better conductor. Until we get graphite added to the cladding  or some other exotic material to distribute the heat, thickness will matter the most for even heat distribution.

I have read several consumer tests and reviews of pans and they fail to note that thermal conductivity and thickness can both be used in practice to balance the temperature distribution and heat flux in a pan.

I am not sure if this still matters, but I owned a copper pan, quickly burnt butter in the pan. I worked on it for two days to get the burn out. Some pan!!

So I would say probably not for your lasagna. Sorry I just don't trust them.


Beef stew was left cooling on the stove for like six hours I cooked a pot of beef stew...I slow cook the roast and vegetables until 2am I fell a sleep and woke up around 9am is it safe to eat?

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


My soup tastes tart... Is it safe to eat? My soup tastes almost like someone poured some lemon juice into it. It smells fine, and other than being a little lemony, tastes OK. When I put it in the fridge a week ago, it didn't have that tart flavor.

What would cause this to happen? Is it safe to eat?

The soup was made from:

Chicken broth
Ground turkey
Ham
Broccoli
Green beans
Onion

I would not eat any soup containing meat more than a day or two after it was cooked, and certainly not if it smelled suspicious. The logic with this kind of thing is simple. If you have any doubts, chuck it out. Not getting food poisoning is worth losing a little soup over.

I frequently eat things that are beginning to go a little tart, I like the flavor. The food is beginning to turn, but is probably not going to hurt you (the germs that cause illness don't add flavor to food). If the flavor is a little off, but the food is still palatable, I would have no problem eating it.


How to raise the setting and melting point of gelatin Is there anyway to raise the setting and melting point of gelatin so that it doesn't melt at room temperature. I've heard that adding pectin can raise the setting and melting point, but I'm no sure.
Thanks.

I have tried a variety of additives to gelatin in a range of blends and unfortunately, nothing seems to significantly increase the melting point. The additives I have tried include: agar, glycerin, corn starch, pectin, sugar, and corn syrup.

To increase the melting point and solidification gelatin often combines with other hydrocolloids such as guar gum, xanthan and carrageenan.


Why does my home-made bread go mouldy? I've been using a Panasonic bread-maker for about 20 years; in fact, I'm on my second machine. I use stone-ground wholemeal flours from different mills and, as I can't easily find Stone-ground Strong White in London, use Organic Duchy White.

For a 300 gm loaf, I vary the amount of different flours, usually 100gm of white and the remainder wholemeal, with 270 ml good water, 1 tablespoon demerara sugar, 1.5 to 2 tablespoons light oil, and 3/4 tablespoon of dry quick-yeast.

For storage, I've been using a good wooden bread-bin with lift-off lid for years, but find that the bread now goes mouldy in about 3 days.

Should I try using less oil? Is there something else that would prevent the loaf moulding so quickly?

Well, I don't think you're doing anything wrong -- I think it's because you aren't using any preservatives in your bread (and that's a good thing, right?). I find my homemade bread has to be eaten in about a week, but I live in a dry climate. A more humid climate might result in it lasting 3-4 days.

A recipe with less sugar and some salt might help. I follow the Panasonic recipe, and use a bare teaspoon of sugar and the same of salt, and a tablespoon of oil. The bread lasts 3 to 4 days in a bread crock.


What makes store brand mayo white? So, I've finally accomplished making mayo. But it has a yellowish hue to it, obviously this is the case because of the egg yolks.

My question is this:  Why is store mayo white?  What makes it white?

I'm fine with mine being the color it is, but now it's driving me crazy as why it's white in the stores. Is it a preservative thing?  Is it an appearance thing?

Short answer: store mayonnaise has less yolks per volume oil, and yolks give most of the yellow color.

Mainly the reason is that store mayonnaise adds water, rather than relying on the moisture in the egg yolks and vinegar.  To quote On Food and Cooking, page 634:

  Though cookbooks often say that the
  ratio of oil to egg yolk is critical,
  that one can only emulsify a half-cup
  or cup of oil, this isn't true. A
  single yolk can emulsify a dozen cups
  of oil or more.  What is critical is
  the ratio of oil to water: there must
  be enough of the continuous phase for
  the growing population of oil droplets
  to fit into.

This means you can use less yolks and just add water to get your volume.  Since yolks impart most of the yellow color (from plant pigments called xanthophylls), this reduces color considerably.

Store mayonnaise also uses some whole eggs, not just yolks, which do not emulsify as well, but are cheaper.  This further reduces the amount of yolk in the result. Note that while home mayonnaises use yolks, store mayonnaises can get away with including egg whites by using very powerful machines to emulsify the mayonnaise, and in some cases add emulsifiers such as lecithin to help stabilize it.

The Experiment!

One whole, very jumbo egg, with a little white wine vinegar (around 15 mL). For oil, I used vegetable oil with a small splash of olive oil.  The total amount of oil used was 1.5 cups, or 350 mL.

First, I tried to create mayonnaise by hand whipping with a mini-whisk.  It turned out a pale yellow, and thickened some, but refused to thicken fully.  This confirms that making a homemade mayonnaise by hand requires yolks or some sort of mechanical beating/blending; whole eggs just don't emulsify well enough.  It's fair to say that the result is quite yellow when it isn't fully blended.

Next, I gave it a shot with my immersion blender:

See how much lighter and paler the mayonnaise is! I can only speculate that the blender created a much finer emulsion, and incorporated more air, reducing the impact of the oil and yolk color on light scattered off the micro-droplets.

Finally, I went ahead and added flavorings (a little dijon mustard, a ton of paprika, salt, pepper, and more vinegar). In this comparison against commercial mayonnaise, you can see that the result is now darker and more orange, courtesy of the paprika.  It is also clear how close the color was before adding paprika.

Clearly, the use of whole eggs is the biggest part of the equation.  It is clear that by adding more water to thin the emulsion and then adding oil to achieve the proper consistency, I could make this even paler, very close to store mayonnaise. The use of mechanical blenders may assist in the process, producing a finer and paler emulsion.

Recipes that include paprika also yield a more yellow-orange result; I think it is for this reason that my commercial mayonnaise uses "paprika oleoresin" in place of ground paprika.

Finally, the use of more heavily colored olive oil appears to darken the resulting mayonnaise. Given how bland my mayonnaise was with only a touch of olive oil, I would encourage you to blend in water and additional oil, rather than avoiding the olive oil.  Ideally, the water would be added about a tsp at a time, when the mayonnaise is still somewhat liquid.

Obviously its white because its mostly EGG WHITE with a fraction of egg yolk powder so they can put a picture and say its made with  eggs and yolk (made with cheap farmed eggs that produce very pale yolks.) Palm oil is clear and vinegar is clear and 'bleaches' any resiidual  yellow (from vitamin A of which yolk consists.) Water makes EVERYTHING in cooking turn dirty grey (see pastry made with water) and not yolk the French way.


How to cook rice for 60 people I have to cook for 60 people, and one of the things I am going to make is (japanese) rice. Normally I cook it in a rice cooker, or in a pan with an amount of water and let it cook until the water has 'dried up'.
Can I use the same way of cooking rice for 60 people? (Say I have 6 kilos rice that needs to be cooked) how much longer is it going to take me to cook rice this way? What can go wrong? Can I just leave it in the pan until its done, or do I need to stir it because of the big amount?

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.

You can't  boil any rice for 30-45 mins, let alone let it sit for another 15 mins while it cooks under it's own heat further. At solid boil, rice is done in max. 10 mins. At boil and steam down, max 20 mins. So with a 40 litre pot, you're gonna need to pre-boil the water, then add rice, and remove fast after 10 mins or so, or it'll cook itself into a mush off the fire after 20 mins (and for the next 5 hours after, till water in pot is cool).


How long to steam eggs for? (Instead of hard boiling) I'm steaming eggs, rather than hard-boiling (I want the same effect), because it's convenient as I'm using the steam from some boiling chickpeas underneath.

But I can't seem to find a definitive estimate for how long to keep them steaming.

One source says 20 minutes. http://www.communitychickens.com/2012/08/the-best-way-to-hardboil-eggs-is-to.html#.Uk0oAX-aejs

I imagine that's too long.

Another source implies 7 minutes. http://whatscookingwithkids.com/2011/05/27/forget-hard-boiling-eggs-steamed-eggs-are-easy-to-peel/ (In the comments.)

And then there is the usual time for hard-boiling, which is 10 minutes.

I don't want to cook them any longer than necessary.

I like to follow Alton Brown's approach: steam for 12 minutes, drop into ice bath. Always turns out perfectly for me this way (and as a bonus, they're much easier to peel than boiled eggs).

Here's the video from Alton's show, with some extra information in it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUHKpHek2E8

And while unrelated (since you want to steam them), if you want to know everything there is to know about hard boiled eggs, this Food Lab edition on Serious Eats has you covered: http://www.seriouseats.com/2009/10/the-food-lab-science-of-how-to-cook-perfect-boiled-eggs.html

20 minutes is the perfect time. I do it like that all the time.


Methods for seasoning wooden spoons? Any tips for seasoning wooden spoons?  I found a couple different methods on the web but they vary quite a bit.  What I've done so far is to sand the new spoons starting with 280, then 320, and finally 1000 grit sandpaper.  Then I put it in water to raise the grain and sanded some more with 1000 grit.  I repeated the last step 4 times and the spoon is nice and smooth.  Is there a final step to season the spoon?

I cannot imagine that sanding and buffing a wooden spoon would have any useful culinary applications, although I suppose it might feel smoother to the touch.

Generally when you season something wooden for food preparation, the purpose is to create a protective layer to avoid warping or impregnation.

If I really wanted to season a spoon, I would season it the same way as a wooden cutting board: Use a food-grade mineral oil and rub it in thoroughly with a cloth or paper towel, then repeat as necessary after it is dry.

Like hobodave, however, I have never done this nor heard of it being done.  The cost of a wooden spoon is probably less than the cost of the mineral oil you'd need to season one.  If your spoon starts to warp or take on strange odours, just buy a new one.

N.B. I can think of one exception, which is if the spoon takes on a fuzzy texture when you get it wet.  In that case, sanding it would be done in the context of raising the grain.  But once again, it's extremely rare that you'd need to do this with a cooking utensil - this is a far more common requirement for homemade (i.e. DIY) wood products.

Skip the mineral oil (petroleum product) and use something more culinary, like olive, coconut, flax seed, or beeswax (you need a heat gun or oven to force beeswax into the wood).

Olive oil go rancid? Sure. But it is safe and it doesn't smell impregnated in the wood. Not significantly, and it won't "off flavor" anything.


Leaving the ladle in the soup considered harmful? There's this belief in my family that leaving the ladle in the soup is bad, but nobody actually seem to know why it would be bad; it's really just a persistent piece of family lore. I never really cared one way or another, but it really started bugging me now that I've started cooking.

Is it just a myth? Or is it indeed harmful in any way to leave the ladle in the soup for any extended period of time? And if so, why? Food safety issues? Maybe outdated food safety issues from the times ladles weren't made of stainless steel? Or it's just seen as impolite?

Maybe because the ladle gets hot and could burn someone?

While I agree with john2103 I would also add that if the soup is thickened with tapioca starch, the soup could un-thicken due to the possible moving ladle.


How to store organic cold press sunflower oil for long term usage? I have opened the bottle and I will be using very little amount daily.
It is not going to be finished soon.

What are the storage instructions?  Should be stored in fridge?

Keep it sealed and in the dark. It will last for a long time so long as it doesn't get contaminated.

Do NOT put in the fridge, it will get ruined overnight.


Making Eggs for 50 people My first time, making scrambled eggs for buffet, my company brought in box of liquid eggs, to be cooked in deep stove top pan. Any suggestions of what needs to be done, how much butter, milk, how to cook without burning them, etc... All help is appreciated...

I highly recommend using a steamer if you have access to one, but if you don't have it, you don't have it. The good news is that the process for making scrambled eggs on the stove is about the same no matter how many eggs you're making - add as much beaten eggs as you're comfortable stirring in the pan, cook over low heat stirring occasionally.

The major tips/gotchas that I can think of:

Open all your egg cartons at once before you start cooking. The last thing you want to be doing is fighting with packaging material when you need eggs quickly
Low heat, be patient, stir frequently but not constantly. Once every couple minutes should be fine depending on the size of your pot - it shouldn't be hard to figure out if you need to be stirring more or less frequently. However, don't forget to stir. This is probably the biggest way for things to come out less than perfectly. If you get distracted and forget to stir the eggs for too long, the ones at the bottom of the pot can start to develop the same green off-color as overcooked hard boiled egg yolks. It's perfectly safe to eat but who wants to eat green eggs?
You mention butter but unless you're adding it for flavor it's honestly not necessary. When you're done there's going to be eggs stuck to the pan no matter what you do. Don't stress yourself out about it.
One tip - if your eggs are cooked more than you want them to be but not at the turning green stage, you have some wiggle room in whisking in uncooked beaten eggs into the overcooked eggs. The heat from the cooked eggs and further hot holding will cook the raw eggs and it will distract somewhat from the overcooked bits. It's not perfect but it's "good enough" and it can help you save a chafing dish of eggs that you'd otherwise have to throw out.

That's really all there is too it. If you have more eggs than you can comfortable fit in the pot, you'll have to do it in batches but all that means is "cook eggs, dump into chafing dish/hotel pan, start cooking more eggs."

From personal experience, I have baked scrambled eggs for large numbers of people (100+ in some instances). I used a recipe similar to this, literally the first link that came up when googled. I have used steamers in the past but found the oven easier for consistency sake, without having to seek out new equipment.