What are the best cooking hacks you've learned over the years?
What are the best practices you've learned to save time or make a meal better.
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Comments221View original on lemmy.world
What are the best practices you've learned to save time or make a meal better.
Ok I might get downvoted to oblivion but I use MSG. It enhances the flavors so much that I have stopped going to restaurants.
Edit- I did my research and found no credible source that says MSG is harmful.
Edit2- If you go to a restaurant or order KFC chances are they use MSG as well
Anti-MSG propaganda actually comes from Asian racism, and was born out of the idea that Chinese food with its MSG was causing headaches and other health effects that were entirely made up. MSG is perfectly fine for you, and it makes a ton of things even tastier. I use it all the time in home cooking.
There is nothing wrong with MSG. It being bad for you is made up by racists.
Uncle Roger agree with you!
Hahaha true
I use MSG in some limited applications, but I always prefer generating glutamates via general cooking techniques. I think there's a layer of complexity that's lost when MSG is used in lieu of browning, for example.
Only thing I'd add is that, on 8, learn what rancid oil smells like. Most people keep things like olive oil in poor conditions (that's without us even getting into quality of oil, or how people buy FAR MORE oil than they'll reasonably be able to use), and the oil goes bad far faster than they think it will.
yeahhh, Hell, there are a couple exceptions, but nothing that goes into a dish should smell bad.
By far my favorite is to have a squirt bottle of water next to my stove. It's great to have throughout the cooking process, especially if you've moved on from Teflon bullshit and are using a pan you pre-heat. To start, you put the pan on the heat and squirt a little water in it. When the water evaporates, the pan is usually in the 350F-400F range. Then when the pan is dry and heated a little more, you can squirt a few more drops in to see if the Leidenfrost effect has taken, uhhh, effect. The way you tell is that the water just dances around on the pan instead of behaving like water normally does, and it's how you know your food won't stick, it is at this point that you add the oil.
Moving on to the actual cooking, let's say you've thrown some chicken thighs in the pan and you've built up a lot of fond (the brown bits that form in the bottom of the pan) and the chicken is almost done, but you're not planning on making a sauce. Deglaze the pan with little squirts of water targeted directly at the fond and rub the chicken thighs over the area where the water is deglazing and suddenly that fond is sticking to your chicken thighs, resulting in a better crust and a cleaner pan.
Speaking of cleaner pan, once you're done cooking and plating and you have a hot dirty pan, squirt enough water in to cover the bottom of the pan and then go eat. When you come back to the kitchen to clean up, the water will have broken down the shit on the bottom of the pan and will steam the sides of the pan, so the pan will wipe clean as easy if all you did was fry an egg.
Finally, I stopped putting milk (of any variety) in my coffee, but I wanna be able to drink my coffee right away and it's too hot when it's made fresh, but I've got a bottle full of room temperature water (all the filtered water in my house comes out ice cold) sitting right there so I can cool it down that way (I brew my coffee pretty strong so watering it down isn't a big deal).
on the pan test, I just run a bit of water onto my hand and flick droplets off my fingers. My reason is that I absolutely LOATHE having anything plastic near the stove. I've had far more mishaps involving errant plastic containers than any other.
Besides, If my hand bacteria can make it into the water and survive a 300+ degree pan, it deserves to outlive all of us.
I'll echo the other comment about deglazing with other flavorful juices to make a better pan sauce (even if it's not going to be a sauce), since I just prefer it that way. BUT, a splash of water into a pan sauce that's simmered for too long WILL restore its glossiness and re-thin it.
Very interesting, ty 4 sharing! Never heard of this but will definitely give it a try. I've got a spare unused squirtbottle already too
The problem with squirting the oil into the pan as it heats is that the metal of the pan heats up a lot slower than the oil so you will burn the oil before your pan is up to temp. Also, pre heating pans will not harm them in any way at all. It sounds like you're applying my comment to Teflon coated pans, which I excluded at the beginning of my comment.
I definitely didn't say to leave the pan on the hob for 20-30 minutes, it takes about 5 minutes. But if putting an empty pot or pan on the heat for 20-30 minutes ruins anything at all on your pans, you need better pans. Every single pan in my kitchen, and I have some budget ones, would just be too hot to handle for a while. On the oil handling the heat, your way puts more heat into the oil than my way and you are way more likely to burn your oil.
When I have to use parchment paper, I crumple the paper ip into a little ball first, then press it out flat into the cooking vessel (sheet pan or loaf pan or whatnot) and it lays flatter/conforms to the pan better without rolling up all over the place rather than trying to just use a pristine sheet of parchment. It really works great.
LPT - go buy a box of half-size sheets from a restaurant supply store. Webstaurant was my go to until they sent their shipping prices into the stratosphere. I buy 1000 sheets at a time and store it with the sheet pans (the box is only a couple inches tall) and it lasts forever. Costs about $50-60 a box iirc which is way cheaper than buying in rolls.
THANK YOU! I was baking cookies last night and struggled through placing the dough while trying to keep the sheet from rolling up. I will do this in the future!
This is a great idea. Alternatively you can buy silicone mats online for cheap that always sit flat too and work just as well.
Use a meat thermometer! All your meat will come out perfect, without being under or over cooked.
Imo this is the single most important tip that made me cook better. Get one of the instant-read ones, they are worth the money.
Also, flatten your chicken so it cooks evenly.
Highly recommend a meat thermometer to everyone. Great recommendation.
Thermoworks.
deglazing. it's when you use an acid to pull all the glaze off the bottom of a pan. it flavors the dish and makes cleaning your pan easier.
rice vinegar and red or white wines are favorites
I also like to freeze leftover stock into an ice cube tray for deglazing, when I just need a little but and not have to open a whole new carton.
If you can take 1 or 2 cubes (or how many you need) out before cooking so they're melted before, great, but I've also had success just throwing the frozen cubes directly into the pan in a pinch.
Reverse taring - instead of placing the bowl on the scale and taring before weighing, place your ingredients on the scale and tare, and you can then scoop out and see the negative weight of how much you have used. This is especially helpful if you are trying to weigh an ingredient into a hot pan you can’t just set on the scale
Now that's a great idea. Timesaver too.
Biggest hack? Realizing that humans have been cooking for millennia, and that it's in the best interest of big business to convince you that it's difficult/expensive/extremely complicated.
You don't NEED the fancy equipment every company out there is trying to sell you.
Not everything needs to be gorgeous on the plate, or a whole production to make.
The poorest people in the world cook delicious food every day.
For instance, you don't need NEED a +$150 Japanese chef knife to cook at home. What you need is something that can hold an edge through general maintenance, a whet stone, a kitchen towel to dry off your blade immediately after you hand wash it, and a little bit of patience.
IKEA sells some surprisingly great single construction (steel blade, steel handle) knives, and their single body chef knife is like $25. Just get an honing rod for use before you start slicing, and a whet stone for periodic sharpening (there's TONS of YouTube videos of all the different ways of sharpening your knife), and remember to wash and hand-dry after you're finished. My chef knife cost me barely anything, and I've used it for years and years, and it still slices through a tomato without a problem. Also, I only cook for myself, so I can absolutely 100% guarantee my whet stone will "outlive" me.
That being said, a mandoline can save a lot of time, and a kevlar glove paired with that will save a lot of fingers.
Not exactly a mandoline, but I used to work at a place with a cheese slicer named "Old Nubby." It had blooded the entire team at least once.
Did they ever learn to use protection?
Each one of them did after nubby took its toll
Legend has it the blood was never cleaned off either
I've had >$150 knives. But my favorite one might still be the first one I bought that was just $30 and pretty unspectacular
Don't be afraid of spices. Use more than you think is necessary. Onion and garlic can make a meal 100x better.
Agree. Especially the onion 🧅
Not good advice with certain hot peppers.
To each their own
This is why restaurant food tastes so good. Fat is flavor. But beware, restaurants don't give a shit about your cholesterol. They want you to have good food that you want to come back for. They'll give you butter and grease all day long. You can cook tasty food at home that won't clog your heart, but it takes a lot to meet the flavor standards of bacon or butter using poultry or vegetable oil. The trick is moderation. Not every meal needs to be a greasy bacon cheeseburger, but you don't have to completely boycott that either.
Save a cut of pasta water to thicken up sauces.
Unless baking or doing a watery/clear soup, never add just water. Anything with flavor that matches the style of cooking will be better.. could be just stock/boujong, wine, beer, cola or acids like vinegar or fruit juices, clam juice, etc. Anything liquid is an opportunity to add flavors.
Grilled cheese hack: assemble the sandwich open-faced on a baking sheet and place under the broiler for a few minutes until the cheese is melted and bubbling and slightly browned, then close it up and cook it like normal in a covered skillet on medium heat with butter. The cheese will be completely melted and (more importantly) it will stay melted while you're actually eating the sandwich, and the browning on the cheese adds a big flavor component.
I used to make them the normal way just in a skillet, and even if the cheese was just barely melted it would cool off and re-solidify before I started eating it. And often I would burn the crust just trying to get the cheese melted.
I worship at the altar of Alton Brown, but I almost think he was kidding with that video. So much extra work just to melt the cheese.
It was a bit of a high effort shitpost. But that doesn't mean we can't learn anything from it. I'm definitely not pulling out a grill and full chimney of charcoal just to make literally grilled cheeses but fresh shredded cheese blends with spices as the filling? Hell yeah! Premelt the cheese so it gets bubbly and crispy? Do it under a broiler! Use something other than Wonderbread? Yes please!
I do love high effort shitposts. They have an oddly profound beauty to them
Alternate grilled cheese hack. Heat the skillet on medium till the skillet is hot. Really wait a couple minutes till it has come up to temperature. Melt a pat of butter on the skillet - don't tear up you bread trying to spread butter on it. Cook the sandwich for one minute in the butter, move it to the side then melt another pat of butter in the empty space. Flip and cook the other side of the sandwich in the new butter. One min+ a little on this side.
Bonus look up inside out grilled cheese sandwiches and do them this way.
@PoodleDoodle
when dicing onions cut radially first, then slice across, it saves you that weird half slice that's traditionally used for dicing onions.
I use cast iron for nearly everything, it survives a hundred years because it's bulletproof not because it's gingerly handled every time it's removed from it's velvet case. People dragged them around on Chuck wagons, you will not kill it with soap. Worst case it gets a little sticky and now you need to cook some bacon in it.
A splash of acid in your soup or stew at the end really wakes it up.
Never cook rice without at least a couple bay leaves. Ideally you'll cook it in chicken stock as well, add flavour where you can.
The best chicken stock in a jar is Better Than Bullion. Hands down. No contest.
With a splash of oil you can cook eggs even in a sticky cast iron pan.
Always use hand protection of some kind with a mandolin. I've never seen a non-pro chef go without and not fuck up their hand. Even pros lose the tips of their fingers sometimes too.
If you want to recreate movie theater popcorn at home you need the following things:
A whirlypop or other stovetop cooker
Coconut oil, refined
Popcorn kernels, quality varies, find a good brand
Fine salt
"Popcorn oil" - this is butter flavored oil sold next to the kernels
Here's what you do, set up a bowl to dump your popcorn in, throw some salt in the whirlypop with a spoon of coconut oil, and just a tiny glug of the popcorn oil, not much just a tad. Add your kernels, crank the heat to high and start cranking. Do. Not. Stop. The popcorn will begin to pop after an interminable wait. Keep cranking until it either gets hard to crank or the popping slows down significantly. Then quickly dump your popcorn into the waiting bowl. Do not add salt, you already did this, the fine salt will be well distributed this way. Add a bit of popcorn oil. Shake the bowl a bit to distribute, add more if desired etc. Then enjoy your movie theater popcorn.
It took me years to work out how to do it without the Naks oil, which I bought from a local popcorn shop for awhile.
What kind of acid are we talking about here, the weak stuff or the stuff that melts through your pot
/s
The kind that lets you see funny colors
That would definitely wake a soup up
chicken (or vegetable) broth in lieu of water to cook rice.
I cannot stress this one enough. This turns simple white rice in practically a risotto. And if you REALLY want to make a risotto, you're just three steps away from this.
Four steps is still a lot more than three steps.
Boil spaghetti in a small amount of water in a frying pan. You won't need to push the pasta down and you'll have lovely starchy water to finish off your sauce — perfect for something like a carbonara!
Another fun fact, you barely need enough water to cover the pasta and it doesn’t even need to be boiling to be working. If you just slightly more than cover the spaghetti with water it heats up much faster and therefor you are done cooking much faster. No need for a giant full pot.
It's really great! I use an electric kettle to shove boiling water on immediately which gets things going quickly too 😄
Yes! This helps cooking go a good bit faster.
This goes against my intuition of years of making pasta. But I'll try it nonetheless.
If you'd like to blow your mind further, submerge the dry pasta cold, then apply heat.
Heterogeneity!
Instead of using a pastry cutter to incorporate butter, freeze the butter then grate it with a box grater then mix it in. It stays much colder. Perfect for pastry or biscuits.
Bake bacon on cookie sheets at 375 for about 20 minutes. You can make a ton of bacon very quickly, with almost no mess, and all the bacon is perfectly flat. We have a double oven and we can make about 4 pounds of bacon in about 30 minutes this way. :)
And then save the bacon grease in a jar to add to gravys! I add a tablespoon or so to my sausage gravy for biscuits and gravy and it is freaking delicious. Can also use it to grease a cast iron pan before making a pizzookie for a little extra flavor.
Cookiesheet bacon is the best! If you like it crispy it helps to broil it for a minute or so at the end of cooking it.
Does this not splatter all throughout the oven?
Yes and no. A substantial amount of grease will be aerosolized and condense on the interior of your oven when it cools. It's nasty looking and the next three cakes you bake will taste slightly of bacon. You can decide whether that's a bug or a feature.
If I could figure out how to make my electric smoker get to 375F I would only do bacon outside in the smoker as I essentially have to clean the over every time I do bacon in it. And, yes, you can smoke bacon. It's not bad, but it also is a bit more like jerky than the crispy bacon I like. Again - bug/feature territory.
I just throw bacon on the barbecue at the same time as my burgers. It takes almost the same amount of time to cook, and it's super crispy - just how I like it.
No, it does not splatter throughout the oven.
I do pretty much the same but at a lower temp (~350F) so it doesn't hit the smoke point. I also prefer my bacon a bit floppy instead of crispy.
Let your protein equalize to room temperature before you cook it. This is a great time to season it as well. Pat dry, then cook.
Rest any grilled or pan fried meat on a non-heated surface for at least 5 minutes after cooking.
“Carry Over Cooking” is a thing that usually results in overcooked food if you don’t account for it.
Learn to make a pan sauce. Easy, quick, and worth it.
That trick of reserving a cup of “pasta water” that you never do? Yeah…
Almost without exception dried herbs/spices go in at the beginning of the cooking process, and fresh go in at the end.
If you work with a group of people start having an “Autumn Potluck” at work. It’s perfect for trying out holiday recipes, before the holiday, and get back constructive feedback and/or nice compliments.
Often recipes are really inefficient and sequenced wrong... Read the whole thing and find the "long pole" , and do that first.. could be starting the oven preheat early, starting the rice cooker right away vs at step 6 or run things in parallel.
This one is a little bit of a hot take, but bottled lemon or lime juice is good for consistency. While fresh will most certainly be better, you may inadvertently juice a bad lemon/lime and potentially ruin a dish. Bottled juices can last a bit longer in the fridge.
Similar, but more situational argument for tinned fruits/veggies. Sometimes, the consistency is more important than the freshness.
Honestly, canned tomatoes will be fresh almost 100% of the time.
Speaking of canned tomatoes, there can be a huge difference between brands. If canned tomatoes make up the bulk of the recipe I prefer to spend a little extra.
I've found that choosing tomatoes canned with minimal to no salt can increase quality.
Mine is to salt or season from up high.
Stop mincing garlic and just get a fucking microplane. Thank you Rachel Ray.
Yea, unfortunately I'm firmly in that half. It takes like 3 seconds to file down a garlic, leaving only the little root part that you pinch. You're gonna have to be really cruising with that press to get a marked time improvement.
I'd use a press if I had to do like a bulb or more.
You don't need to slave over a stove for 3 hours to get caramelized onion. Here's what you do. After slicing the onion, get the pan up to a medium heat with a splash of oil. Toss in the onions and add a bit of salt to make them sweat. Once they start to dry out, go golden at the edges, and even stick to the pan a bit, add a splash of water. You do have to stir continuously for this method as well, but it takes much less time. Do this process a few times where you add water, cook it until its dry, another splash of water, cook it until it dries out again, etc. Sometimes I'll even alternate in a splash of white wine for fun. You should have beautiful caramelized onions in 30 min with this method.
You can also add a pinch of baking soda greatly speed up the process
Alternately, a mandolin, slow cooker, and an ice cube tray are amazing.
Mando up a 5lb bag of onions, toss in the slow cooker, & 6 hours later you have the most delectable flavors.
I usually take half the onions and make French onion soup, and the rest into the ice box. They thaw perfect in the fridge, or a sauté pan.
Ah, the alchemy of the kitchen! A dash of efficiency, a sprinkle of passion, and a dollop of savviness. First off, mise en place - French for 'put in place.' Prepare your ingredients ahead of time, it can help remove a loot of stress.
Secondly, invest in a sharp knife - it's the Excalibur of the culinary world, turning the toughest veggies into paper.
Lastly, experiment! Like any good inventor, a chef isn't afraid of a few mishaps; it happens to the best of us! You'll surprise yourself with some of things you may come up with 😉
I am all about mise en place. My wife doesn't want to dirty a few extra dishes and ends up trying to do too much while things are cooking and stressing herself on out.
I was honestly the same when I was starting out in the kitchen and quickly learned I'd rather clean a few extra dishes, than get myself overly stressed!
If I'm doing a lot of different ingredients, I'll chop, put in dish to store, and then layer the prepped ingredients on plastic wrap, payments, or wax pape in one or two bowls. Or even on the counter. Not as environmentally sound, but there are times where it's more doable than separate dishes.
Use silicone toppers and enjoy the best of both worlds.
Collecting as many tips as I've handed out!
And a high quality knife sharpener. Even the best knives eventually get dull.
Very true and a great addition!
Corollary: as you empty a dirty dish, put it directly into the dishwasher or give it a quick wash and dry while the ingredients sweat/simmer/cook. Nothing is quite as nice as having the kitchen nearly cleaned up as you plate your meals. (my wife taught me this - it only took me 25 years to learn!)
Besides mise en place, also clean as you go. Basically you only have to clean the pot(s) you cook in, everything else has already been cleaned. And invest in a knife sharpener. They go dull very quickly. And a big box of bandaids :-)
Probably known, but stainless steel cookware is the best you just need to make sure it's hot enough first before you start to cook. Drop a pinch of water in the pan, if it dances around you're good too go.
To get a good sear on a steak in a pan, the pan doesn't have to be super hot, you just have to make sure the contact surfaces are as dry as possible.
If your stew tastes like it's missing something, it's bay leaf.
Don't buy hyperspecialized tools for cooking if you can use more generalized tool for the task with the same amount of effort. You can do a lot with a good chef's knife.
Cut through greasiness with a bit of acid.
Adding a little bit of sugar, but not so much you can taste the sweetness, to otherwise salty dishes will mellow out and enhance the flavor of the dish.
Can you give more details on searing the steak? I get a good sear in some spots, usually on the rim of the steak. The middle turns out greyish-brown sometimes.
Sure. First, cast iron pan is a must, since it has a high heat capacity because of its weight.
Your issue is the uneven distribution of heat, so use enough oil is important, at least as much to cover the bottom of the pan evenly.
Second thing is salt, if you salt it too early, it's going to absorb the water from the meat and create wet spots, which would be steamed instead of seared. Dryness is the key here, you either want to salt the steak immediately before adding it to the shimmering oil, or you can salt it and leave it uncovered in the fridge for a couple of hours for the it to dry off.
If the center is gray it's simply not touching the pan. Forget most of the lore and go with the science - you need the surface of the meat to reach 300F (150C) to create the Maillard reaction which is the "good" browning.
I dry, salt with Diamond kosher, sit for ~5 mins (prob too short, but I sous vide so I don't want the steak to cool too much), wipe on a very thin coat of EV Olive Oil then sear for about a minute a side on a 400F pan. I use both cast iron and non-stick aluminum on a 15,000BTU burner and find very little difference in the final result. YMMV
Sorry for the off topic, but do I understand correctly that this account is being used by multiple people on Margot Robbie's team to post and comment, and ultimately attract attention for the Barbie movie? If I have that right, that's a really great marketing strategy that I haven't seen before. It would be cool if you could find a way to let us know how it works out.
How can you be so sure of anything you read on the Internet?
What do you think the point I'm trying to make is here?
I can't be, which is why I was asking.
I scanned through your profile, comments, and posts. The profile itself says it's staffed by a team to market the movie. You made a whole bunch of posts without commenting on them initially, so I assume it was to get conversation going. Some of the comments reference the movie, but most are like the one above that seem to be good faith attempts to answer questions.
So I don't know, but there's at least an implication that the account is designed to get people talking, and maybe notice the account name, getting some attention for her work. The other leading option would be that you have no association with Margot Robbie at all and are just screwing with people.
But that's all just me reading and guessing. You're the one who can actually answer: what is the point you're trying to make?
Replace everything plastic with glass.
Any brand recommendations? My pyrex lids are all cracked. Probably shouldn't have put them in the dishwasher...
Unless it's a cutting board. Plastic cutting boards are great cause you can throw them in the dish washer.
But if you do this, replace it often. Tiny cuts make places for bacteria to grow and you end up cutting tiny bits of plastic into your food.
I use plastic containers if something's going in the freezer.
Generally I completely agree, but I do have an embarrassingly large number of deli containers in various sizes. Great for leftovers or drinking water.
Get the grocery store herb plants if they have them in your area. It's possible to repot them and have them produce for a while, you can snip off basil stalk tops and shove them in fresh damp soil to propagate.
Fresh herbs are a game changer, but they are finishers, not starters. You're looking for aroma from fresh. In many cases, you'll herb a dish twice. At the beginning with dry and at the end with chiffonade barely mixed in. Throwing fresh in early works ok, but the aroma is muted and they immediately wilt which is not ideal.
If there's not a sunny window or outdoor space to grow herbs in, you can get cheap grow lights with a timer for about $45. Worth it!
I swear that thyme is called that because ain't nobody got thyme to get all those little leaves off the stem. Just saute a bunch of stems in your fat to infuse the flavor and take out the stems before adding anything else.
yeah, honestly thyme is probably better dried anyway.
Mandolines are not you friend. They thirst for blood.
Seriously if you get one get a safety mandoline like the once for all brand.
Can confirm.
If you're American, you don't want to have to pay an ER bill when you slice the tip of your finger off, like I did.
Or pair it with a pair of kevlar gloves or similar. But yes, every commercial cook I know says the worst kitchen incident they've seen involved a mandolin.
Alton Brown recommends a Kevlar glove when using a mandolin.
Kevlar glove.
Yup, two big and noticable scars on my fingers now. Didn't lose digits thankfully. If I use that thing ever again I'm using the guard and just cutting what's left with a regular knife.
Always salt your pasta water to the equivalent of sea water salty. It'll make your pasta taste much better.
The common saying is "as salty as the sea" but that's actually a lot more salt than you would think. 2-3 teaspoons of salt for a large pot of water is plenty. If your water was actually as salty as the sea, your pasta would taste awful
I put 3 tbsp of salt in 3 liters. I looked up seawater saltiness. It's ~2 tbsp per liter. So I guess my salty water is half the saltiness of the sea.
Seawater is about 3.5% salt. That means 35 grams of salt per litre, so in 3 litres of seawater, there would be 105 grams of salt. Measuring salt by volume does not equate to measuring it by weight since you're typically using grains of varying sizes depending on the type of salt.
Just as an experiment, try weighing out 105 grams of salt just to see what that looks like.
Seawater is salty AF.
It’s not really a hack I think, but having a good instant probe thermometer really gives you the ability to be consistent no matter what, especially if you’re cooking proteins or have something that’s temperature dependent.
I had started with a cheaper one and eventually graduated to a Thermapen when I realized how critical it was to the things I was making.
The cheapest Thermapen brand one is worth 10 generic ones.
I have both. I like that the thermopen actually does read faster and I can see the temp gradient in my meat and find the coolest spot faster. The ergonomics are better. Also, a name brand thermopen, on sale, costs less a kilogram of prime filet.
Nope.
You can make a delicious, calorie dense chicken noodle soup on an extreme budget with canned chicken, chicken broth, and ramen noodle packages. That meal kept me from going hungry on multiple occasions during college.
More ways to measure are always better. It can give you more data as to what works, what doesn't, and how to reproduce it.
Simply adding a kitchen scale and a digital temperature kettle has upped my coffee game. A meat thermometer has removed the guesswork from my fish/steaks/roasts/chicken, and they're perfectly cooked every time. Out of the three, the kettle is the only one that was more than $30 (because I decided to go boojee and get a gooseneck for pourover coffee).
Also:
Always keep canned tomatoes in the pantry. Particularly tomato paste. It's a great ingredient that can add a depth of flavor to a variety of dishes.
Whole spices really do make a big difference and it's worth knowing how to use them even if you don't make them part of your everyday cooking. When its time to make a special dish, using whole spicessl that you grind fresh will be worth it.
Use acid in your cooking. Citrus, viniger, wine, yogurt, etc will often upgrade a dish.
Parchment paper/aluminum foil is your friend. Minimize your time scrubbing dishes by minimizing the mess you make when baking food.
I have a few recipes that were clearly written or modified by someone using really old ground spices. Like I have a recipe for apple muffins that legitimately calls for two teaspoons of nutmeg.
I do like 4 rubs of a nutmeg on the microplane and it's perfect.
Isn't nutmeg toxic in the right amount
Add salt as you cook, not all at the end.
Interesting, what's the benefit to this? I always learned to add salt to taste just before serving
The key phrase there is "to taste." You add a baseline level of salt at the appropriate time (which is often but not always at the beginning), then adjust it at the end.
One reason you might use salt at the beginning is to pull moisture out of fruits like tomatoes or eggplant, or to push moisture into meats like chicken breast.
There is a very specific stage to frying potatoes or sautéing onions that I add salt specifically to pull the moisture out. I couldn't articulate when this is. You just... know. Like half way through somewhere right after they sweat and before they begin to caramelize.
Knife skills.
Buy a very good chef's knife. There are expensive options, there are some more affordable options. Carbon steel is best, but there are some very good stainless alloys too. Do some research. Don't cheap out, this is a tool you'll buy for life if properly maintained. Pro range Wüsthof, Zwilling or Kai are great options.
Learn how to properly and safely use it.
Learn how to maintain it and keep it razor sharp (not exaggerating, you should be able to shave your arm after sharpening it). I use a dual sided Japanese wet stone (1000/3000 grit), it's great.
Not only proper knife skills with a good, balanced, sharp knife are much safer and save a lot of time, they also make cutting a joy instead of a chore.
I agree with you 100%, I use both Wüsthof and Zwilling at home and have subscribed to the mindset of "a dull knife is a dangerous knife" for a long time.
However, I would place more emphasis on learning to sharpen a knife and purchasing a whetstone kit, because even the cheapest 2nd hand blade can be made to cut razor sharp at least once.
Yeah I sharpened a shit Ikea knife once. It was good for about 5 minutes. A quality knife holds an edge for a very long time. I use and mine daily and hone them about every other day, and feel the need to resharpen them maybe once every two months.
PSA: a honing steel does NOT sharpen a knife, it straightens the edge and should be used very gently.
Also, never buy knives in kits. First of all, these are shit 99% of the time. And second, when properly used, a chef's knife is the only knife you'll ever need.
Many knife kits come with very nice blocks to store your knives in, and the other sizes are worth having even if you only use them 1% of the time.
I can't imagine serving a platter of cheese and crackers with a chef kife for example. And there are perfectly good knife sets available.
My point is, in the context of a "cooking hack" perspective, if you're about to spend 100€ to really up your prep game, spend it on an single, multipurpose, high quality knife instead of six or seven bad ones. There are good kits available, but good kits from reputable brands are super expensive, and you end up paying a lot for knives that won't see much use.
You can buy a cheap cheese knife where the quality doesn't matter as much for cheese platters and a decent paring knife later when you've mastered your chef's knife and feel you sometimes need something smaller and more nimble.
But for the everyday cook, where all you need 99% of the time is to quickly and efficiently chop some vegetables, dice some onions and cut some protein, you don't need anything more than a chef's knife.
I've been out of the knives game for a while, but I'm pretty sure Victorino Fibrox knives are still one of the best bang for the buck.
I'm glad to hear that! I have a 8" chef's knife, 3 ¼ straight paring knife and a 12" serrated slicing knife, they work wonders and I can do everything with them.
Yes, a good chef knife really upped my cooking.
Brine chicken breast. I save brines from things like pickles and feta for this and choose whichever one best matches what I'm making. Feta + chipotle makes awesome burritos.
I always see recipes say to heat a pan until the oil shimmers but I've never been able to see the difference. Instead, I drop a couple pieces of diced onion into the pan and wait to hear a sizzle. This is extra helpful for someone with adhd like me who would absolutely start a fire if I didn't have a noise to remind me that I'm cooking
Not really a cooking hack but freezing grapes works really well and they're a yummy and easy snack especially in summer. If you think your grapes might go off before you can use then or you got a batch that isn't as crisp as you'd like just freeze em.
Works with any berry as well.
Frozen grapes are great for cooling drinks, and since they don't melt, they won't dilute your drink with water like ice cubes would
If you cook by using a cooking recipe you can be creative (within reason). If you BAKE by following a baking recipe stick to the letter!
I teach my kids that cooking is art and baking is science. You have to be precise with measurements in baking, not so in cooking.
When cooking minced meat for taco filling or anything similar, cook half of it regularly, and then really cook the crap out of half of it until it's almost crispy, it really makes the texture more enjoyable.
Not really cooking, just preparation, but I used to eat pomegranates from our tree as a kid. Pomegranates have little seeds that stain and which are really hard to avoid puncturing. My dad used to have us eat on a picnic table out back rather than indoors, because we'd invariably be squirting the stuff all over.
Years later, I ran across someone pointing out that you can just take a bowl of water, and break open the pomegranates under the surface of the water. The (edible) seeds and (inedible) rind mostly separate, and there's no mess. It worked wonderfully.
I wish that we'd known about that back then. Would have made eating them way easier.
Buy an air fryer and a pressure cooker. Save time and money.
When slow cooking a roast lay it on a bed of potatoes or whatever other sides you want, fill the water to the top of the veggies (or taters) then soak the roast in your sauce of choice. Gravity and heat will help the sauce work into the veggies giving them a nice flavor. The roast pretty much always comes out perfectly moist and you get amazing veggies out of the deal.
Mine is, don’t eat anything solid, hold your poop for 3-days. When the redditors arrive why won’t understand, but whatever food you eat will be the best you ever tasted, they also will remain confused about why there is so much karma on your foodporn posts!
Use an instant pot for beans. Saves water and a ton of time. You can also use it to cook rice or pasta.
Exact measurements and specific spices aren't that important if you're just making a meal at home. The point is just to make it tasty and probably healthy.
These are also great for making big batches of shredded chicken, pork, and beef which can be helpful for meal prepping or making things in bulk and freezing them.
Haha pressure canner go fsssssss
(In other words, most Instant Pots aren't all that big.)
There are still people who don't user probe thermometers. This is the single best cooking tip I can give:
Taste as you go and taste everything! Understanding how the components of your meal taste is a great way to make yummy things. It also helps you learn how ingredients manifest in the end result and will help you expand your cooking versatility
Just from a practical perspective: use your microwave as rarely as possible! Leftovers can be really amazing - sometimes as good or better than the original dish - but only when heated properly!
One massive exception: reheating coffee. Don't leave your coffee maker on with a pot there. It will burn your coffee unless you agitate it frequently, which let's be real, none of us is doing. It's better to just turn your pot off as soon as the pot is done filling. Want more coffee in an hour? Microwave it. Why? Microwaves work by exciting water molecules. Your coffee will warm up very quickly this way, so go in short bursts and/or lower the power setting. This works for other similar liquids too, like heating up broth before adding it to whatever you're cooking. Just don't overdo it in the microwave because it will overflow if you aren't careful!
Very good point! Microwaves are really the only way to reheat coffee. It's not as good as just finishing the cup before it gets cold in the first place, but it's miles ahead of every other option.
Not to disagree, but I find many people don't know how to use their microwave. There are 10 power settings. Most microwaves allow you to do two settings at once. Just like we don't put everything in the oven at 450° we don't need to cook everything on the 10th power in a microwave. Especially in this summer a microwave makes a huge difference in energy usage and also cuts down on adding extra heat in the house.
So while you're not wrong about things tasting better being reheated in other ways besides the microwave, we also need to learn how to use our microwaves.
But... Why? What is "heating properly"? I heat almost anything in the microwave and it works perfectly, tastes just like any other way to heat stuff up. Most of the time it even works better, since it heats more evenly than almost any other method.
A microwave will heat stuff unevenly most of the time. You can get it to be better with hacks like changing the power setting and using a wet paper towel, but the evenness of heating will always be better on the stove or in the oven.
In addition, you can have more control over important variables like salt and moisture content if you don't use the microwave. Lots of food... especially meats like chicken, will dry out to hell in a microwave. By switching to a stove or oven you can rekindle the original flavor and texture.
Lastly skipping the microwave allows you to heat stuff in a more modular way. If I was reheating a pasta with grilled chicken, I would get a better result 100% of the time if I start the chicken on the stove and then add the pasta later. You get a browning effect on the chicken and you can more easily time how done it needs to be before the pasta is added.
Weird, you seem to be having a completely different experience from me. Maybe because of "be better with hacks like changing the power setting"? I never considered this a hack, I just use like a middle to low power setting on the dial, arrange the food evenly on the plate, set it in there for 5 minutes or so and everything's basically the exact same again as if I had just cooked it.
Even chicken. I mean sure, if you blast it full force and heat it up to more than consuming temperature (40°C/100°F) of course it will dry out, but you can just.. not do that. If you put chicken in the pan with too much heat you also dry it out.
The difference for me is literally just a few seconds of work instead of a few minutes.: doing it in the pan/oven takes a few minutes of me being there, then I also have to clean the pan, versus I arrange it on a plate, put it in the microwave, go do something else for a few minutes, then I eat.
Patience. Good food doesn’t have to take a long time, but you need to give each step the respect it deserves, sometimes it will take a little longer. Mise en place is an important step, and so is reading the entire recipe thru before beginning. Also read recipes, even if you never intend to cook them, because you’ll discover new techniques and combinations that might elevate an old favourite.
To caramelize onions quickly, sprinkle them with a small amount of baking soda.
Not really a hack but just something important, always remember to account for how much salt you need if you don't have the recipes specific type of salt because different salt types have different shapes and sizes
Also (and I know this is obvious to many) aim to undersalt your dish. You can always add more salt but it's hard to fix oversalting. If it needs more flavors, use herbs and spices. If you've already added a good bit of salt and you're nervous about oversalting, add some acid. Wine, vinegar, lemon juice, lime juice, etc. That might reveal flavors that the salt was trying to bring out!
Instant pot wasn't just a craze. You can take a 6 hour chili and get it done in 90 minutes.
That said, while they're not one trick ponies, they're not as good at most of their other tricks as regular cookware. That said, you need to sear meat and cook a stew in one it, it's completely reasonable.
Sousvide is amazing, as long as you like rare-medium meat and corn. If you're going to cook it to medium well, sousvide is a waste of your time.
I love the instant pot especially for two things: Cooking beans and making broth.
I get a nicer texture from beans done in the instant pot than I do cooking them any other way. And I can knock out a big pot of chicken stock in like an hour. If you want it to be totally clear you have to let the pressure release naturally, but I don't care if it's cloudy because I'm just gonna turn it into something opaque anyway usually so I do a quick release so it's done faster.
I also used it to cook in summer before I got an induction burner, because my apartment's shitty electric stove dumps heat everywhere.
Mine is kind of bitchy, when searing meat first it always tends to set off the burn alarm or whatever halfway through the pressure cook part. Apparently leaving the fond at the bottom to be released during the rest of the cooking isn't possible.
BURN gets triggered when the sensor sees the pot temperature ramp over boiling temp faster than pressure would allow. It's caused by the bottom of the pot being too dense, there being a lack of water in the pot, or a loose lid seal.
In your case, it's probably the fond letting it overheat. Have a plate next to it. When the meat is seared, pull the meat out and deglaze the bottom of the pot with water or wine and a wooden spatula. return the meat into the juices and continue with your recipe.
Mise en place! Clean as you go.
If you need to cool your pot down now pour running cold tap water on the outside of the pot. Not something you need when everything goes smoothly, but trying new recipies sometimes things go a little bit wrong and cooling the pot down quickly can save your dinner.
Running cold water will cool a pot to room temperature in seconds. Just beware if your pot is really hot cooling it down that fast could damage it. Should be fine at sensible cooking temperatures though.
Clean as you go, don't just leave it all for the end. Onions are sauteing and you're done chopping everything? Good, wash your cutting board and knife and clean up any messes before the next step. Sausage is done browning and you're dumping it in with the onions for a minute with the garlic and some herbs? Great, wash that pan and spoon and set it down to dry and wipe up all the oil splashes.
Just makes clean up so much easier after you've eaten and you're much more efficiently using your time.
Some day I will learn to be better 🙂 For now I just wreck my kitchen everyday
Every time I try to do this I burn my onions.
In I'm sure TOTALLY unrelated news I'm also getting screened for ADHD...
Lower the heat, add more oil. You don't need to blast onions at high or even medium high to saute or to carmeloanthonyize them. You can do it!
Low and slow is the way to go!
Take care of your knives. Hand wash them, dry with a towel, and put them back in a block when you're done. They'll stay sharper for much longer that way, instead of letting them bang around in the dishwasher and then thrown into a drawer.
Also the Ninja Foodi is the best cooking device ever made, second only to the invention of pots and pans.
Another thing to note is that its not just the banging around, but putting (some) knives in (some) dishwashers will heat them to the point of ruining their temper, so they won't keep their edge for as long.
Yes on both accounts. I have one chef knife and one paring knife. I take care of both, and chopping everything is a pleasure.
The ninja toaster is pretty sweet too.
And for F's effing sake, don't put them on the drying rack tip down.
Please tell my mother in law.
Brine chicken breast. I save brines from things like pickles and feta for this and choose whichever one best matches what I'm making. Feta + chipotle makes awesome burritos.
I always see recipes say to heat a pan until the oil shimmers but I've never been able to see the difference. Instead, I drop a couple pieces of diced onion into the pan and wait to hear a sizzle. This is extra helpful for someone with adhd like me who would absolutely start a fire if I didn't have a noise to remind me that I'm cooking.
To actually cook things enough. I wasn't cooking them to unsafe levels before, and please don't cook my steak above medium rare, but some foods just taste better cooked more. Almost no one cooks ground meats enough, who the hell wants grey beef, get some color on that bitch. Also if you cook sausage meat enough it gains color and the flat renders out a little it tastes better. Get some colour on those roast veggies and no one likes a pale insipid fry. A change in color is flavor, use it to your advantage. And yes sometimes you want your veggies firm and for the love of god don't overcook your garlic.
Certain cuts of steak tend to be better at medium. Ribeye is one of them, as it gives more time for the fat to render.
True, I was just being general in case people thought I was a well done steak aficionado.
I agree with you on getting color in your food. I think the best way to do that is to cook it at the right temperature (don't be afraid of heat!) and don't crowd the pan. And don't be too stir-happy.
Ground beef, for example. You don't have to cook it long it you start with a hot pan that's big enough. Get a pan with a heavy bottom and heat it up empty for a minute or two on medium or medium- high heat. Plop the meat in. It should sizzle. Break it up enough for it to cover the pan, and then don't stir for a couple minutes. You can stir it when you see some brown forming on the bottom layer.
That was the hardest thing for me to learn to do, to just let the food be and not stir it all the time. Stirring feels like you're doing "something" lol.
Crowding the pan is my most frequent error due to laziness & rushing. I'm learning to do things in batches.
Also, chopping my vegetables in smaller pieces when stir frying.
Best thing I've done for my bread baking is weighing my flour rather than doing it by volume. It also makes it easier to check your ratio of flour to water
Buy a jar of msg to sit next to the salt. Game changer.
Also, salt+fat+acid+heat = flavor. Sometimes a pinch of sugar. I was chronically underutilizing fat and acid.
pay attention. stay with what you are cooking as you are cooking it. don't let yourself become distracted. taste as you go. take notes. use unsalted butter. know your equipment and its pros/cons. shop at different stores for the best ingredients. fresh herbs are waaay better if you can swing it.
Using just enough smoked tabasco sauce to not get the dish spicy or too spicy will add some smoky aftertaste to the flavor of the dish. Just as any other spices, it can be added towards the end
If you're making rice without using a rice cooker, the amount of water you need is not quite a direct ratio like the package suggests. You need a 1:1 ratio of rice to water plus an additional quarter to half cup of water depending how firm you like your rice.
Use a piping bag to fill muffin tins/cupcakes. Saves so much mess and crumpled paper.
That sounds like it involves a lot more mess with the addition of a piping bag that can't even handle the chunks in many of my recipes. How does spooning crumple paper?
Clearly you have a better technique than me. When i spoon batter into paper cups, the spoon inevitable touches the paper, sticks to it, and causes it to fold and stick to the batter in the rest of the cup. At least a third of my cups end up messy and misshapen. Piping works great for me, but I dont do a lot of things with "chunks."
My spooning always leads to sticky touching (PHRASING!) but I just smooth it out and move on. Nothing of value is lost.
Upvote for phrasing
More of a baking tip, but if you want a chocolate cake to taste extra moist and chocolatey, add a cup of coffee to the batter. It should be thin and runny, it'll sort itself out in the bake.
For easy to peel hard boiled eggs, cool them slowly and peel while still warm. More detailed instructions: when done boiling, set the pot, undrained, in the sink with a butter knife under one side to slightly tilt the pot. Run a very thin stream of cold water from the faucet into the pot and go do something else for 20 minutes or so. When the eggs are comfortably warm, roll them against the inside of the sink until the shell is well cracked and they should slip easily out of the shell. If you get a stubborn one, just dip it back into the pot and it should pop out easily. Thanks Grandma for teaching me this one!
Sorry Grandma, but for easy peel boiled eggs that peel easily anytime -- hot or cold -- simply keep the raw eggs cold and in the fridge until the water has come to the boil. Only then take them out of the fridge. Carefully add eggs to the water. Slow boil for 11 minutes. Cool under cold running water for a minute or two. Peel them now or place in the fridge for later -- they will peel easily whenever you want.
I'm going to try your method and report back.
Typically, I do an inch of room temp water over the eggs, bring to a rolling boil, kill the heat and lid for 10-12 minutes. I get a nice, barely hard texture on the yolk that way.
I'm wondering if the shock of the boiling water might cook the egg whites faster than the interior, though, making the exterior firmer in the long run when it comes time to peel. I've tried a ton of different cooling methods, and absolutely none of them have changed how easy or hard to peel the eggs are (though, draining the hot water, then running cold water directly over the eggs, followed by a bunch of ice into the pot, DOES seem to prevent the yolks getting a green rim).
I'm going to disagree with both the time and the any-time-post-chill advice. There are a bunch of ways to boil eggs, but mine is to slow between 16-17 minutes at 208F (I use 208 because I'm at 2500'ASL, 212 will be a little faster at sea level). My MIL swears by bringing the eggs to a boil in cold water then lidding and turning off the heat and removing after 17 minutes. For me, under 16 guarantees uncooked yolk at the center, over 18 and I get green yolks.
Peeling the next day is always a chore compared to peeling after running under cold water for a couple minutes (I dump in some ice).
I'm not super experienced with making pickles. Would you want to reheat the brine before adding back into the jar to better help it penetrate the pickles?
I'm a big fan of frozen herbs, frozen cubes of garlic save a ton of time breaking open cloves, frozen basil still has that fresh taste and smell relative to dried.
If you make pizza in a home oven, baking steel is a game changer. It gets nice and hot and makes your crust crispy. Like a pizza stone but better.
If you have a blender, try making your own almond milk for a fraction of the cost. It's easy.
Elaborate on the almond milk, and does it work with oat and cashew as well?
@HappycamperNZ It should.
Nut milk:
Some people like to strain it through a sieve or add a stabilizer, but I think that's too many steps, so just be aware it just might need a shake or a stir before serving. I started making my own when regular protein shakes at the gym caused my consumption of almond milk to go way up.
Cheers!
TY
@HappycamperNZ
Soak raw almonds overnight.
Blend at 1 to 4 ratio. Ex: 1 cup almonds, 4 cups water. Strain through nutbag or cheesecloth. Save pulp for recipes (Google will help)
Some people drink the milk as is but to me, but it tastes even more amazing if you cook it on a stove just until it starts to boil and immediately turn off heat. Add a tablespoon sugar.
Cashews: same but don't need to boil. These don't strain as well so some people prefer using high speed blender and not strain but I didn't care for it that way. I haven't made oat milk that I'm happy with so no advice on that
Oat is so easy. And you can easily get organic, gluten free oats if that is important to you, plus you can make it when you need it - no store trip or disposable containers.
You just need a blender/food processor and a milk bag (you can get away with almost anything but the milk bag removes the most silt, if you only have a strainer w large holes, let the milk sit and pour off the top gently, it will leave the silt)
NB: some people add oil or vanilla or a couple cashews - I like it plain, if you want more excitement, you can find recipes where they use other stuff, or just have fun experimenting!
Also NB: the recipes I started with said that immediately processing and only gently straining will prevent any sliminess. I haven’t had that problem, so I don’t know if it’s because I do it that way or because I don’t have slimy oats?!?
I take issue with that one specifically. Frozen, jarred, canned, tinned or tubed garlic is so much worse than freshly chopped garlic and it really isn't that much of a hassle to peel and chop it.
I'm lazy as shit and use tons of garlic and you just smash it with the broad side of the knife and give it a little slap slap to chop it up and you're done. I've never had non fresh garlic that's anywhere near as good as fresh garlic, same with ginger. Pickled ginger's good too, but it's not the same thing as regular ginger and isn't interchangeable in most recipes.
I'm not even that much of a snob about fresh ingredients, I almost exclusively use refrigerated lemon and lime juice because I don't go through those often enough to keep them fresh and it's 95% there, but garlic is probably the one thing that I refuse to get preprocessed.
@BettyWhiteInHD I agree with you when it comes to canned or jarred garlic, but I can't tell the difference when I cook with frozen, at least for minced or mashed garlic. I use the kind they sell at Trader Joe's, 'dorot' brand, not sure if others taste different. Usually I'm using it as an aromatic for sautéing. I really only bother with fresh if I need to slice the cloves a specific way.
That's fair enough if you can't taste the difference, but I've tried that exact same brand (they also do other herbs) and I can't stand it.
I don't know, I love garlic, maybe I am a garlic snob lol.
Get a mandolin for cutting veggies. OMG, it's so quick and easy!
Not a hack but Home Chef has made my life infinitely better
Yo, people, don't sleep on this!!
The wife was complaining about the breadth of our dinner selection so we got a 3 month sub for our anniv one year. They were tasty meals that were dead easy to prepare. We didn't renew (they're not cheap), but from those recipes we've added 3-4 new "favorites" into our meal rotation using their recipe and technique. Practically all their stuff tastes good from the kit, so you get to see how easy it is to prepare without the head-scratching of picking random recipes on the internet (and having to order pizza when it turns out terrible).
Learn to properly dice an onion. It's not hard and when you do it right you shouldn't have much or any problems with watery eyes. I often cut a couple of onions at a time, lay them out on a sheet in my freezer, then move them to a bin. That usually makes enough diced onion to last me a couple months.
For fresh (or edible) food:
Sight: look at the food. For veggies & fruit cut away the affected pieces. For meals / salads etc, throw it away.
Smell: if stuff smells foul, sour or moldy when it shouldn't - throw it away
Taste: if above seems okay, take a tiny taste. If you think it seems off, throw it away.
Trust your instincts!
Store ripe avocados submerged in water and they last weeks.
Careful with that one https://www.everydayhealth.com/diet-nutrition/fda-warns-against-risky-new-avocado-trend/