Cooking Hints & Tips Archive 5
Cooking Tip: To make juicing a lemon easier, halve or quarter it. Heat on 100% power 20 to 30 seconds. Squeeze out juice.
Cooking Tip: To melt chocolate in the microwave, heat 1 ounce in a bowl on 100% power, uncovered, for 1 minute.
Cooking Tip: To heat pancake syrup in a microwave, put 1/2 cup in a microwave-safe container and heat it at 100% power, uncovered, for 20 to 30 seconds.
Cooking Tip: To soften cream cheese in a microwave, heat 3 ounces of it in a bowl at 100%, uncovered, for 15 to 30 seconds.
Cooking Tip: To soften butter in a microwave, heat 1/2 cup of it, uncovered, on 10% power for 45 seconds or till softened.
Cooking Tip: Eggs are easiest to separate when cold. Do not pass the yolks back and forth from shell half to shell half to separate. Bacteria may be present in the pores of the shell, contaminating the yolk or white.
Cooking Tip: When you whip a recipe with cream or egg whites you are adding air and increasing the volume of the ingredients. This will produce a lighter, fluffier product when cooked.
Cooking Tip: To cut a food into julienne strips, cut first into thin slices. Stack slices and cut into matchlike sticks.
Cooking Tip: You shouldn't grease a baking pan with margarine or butter as they contain salt that generally causes hot foods to stick.
Cooking Tip: You may freeze cheesecake, well wrapped. Thaw it in the refrigerator for four to six hours before serving.
Cooking Tip: If you brush your turkey with vegetable oil, such as corn or canola oil, before you put it in the oven, your turkey will develop a nice, shiny brown look.
Cooking Tip: Leftover cooked turkey can stored in the refrigerator for three days and in the freezer for up to two months.
Cooking Tip: A turkey is done when a meat thermometer inserted in the thickest part of the thigh reads 180F degrees.
Cooking Tip: Make sure stuffing is fully cooked if roasted inside a turkey by using a meat thermometer. The temperature needs to read 160F degrees.
Cooking Tip: Salting a turkey is a waste of time since the flavor will not penetrate the skin or rib cage.
Cooking Tip: Pickled foods are generally high in sodium. To reduce the salt in pickled cucumbers and peppers, rinse with cold water before eating.
Cooking Tip: Nutritionally, brown eggs are the same as white eggs, although they are often more expensive. The color of the shell is determined by the breed of the hen.
Cooking Tip: Don't freeze cabbage, lettuce, or other raw leafy greens, cucumbers, celery, or radishes - they'll be mushy when thawed.
Cooking Tip: Freezing adversely affects the texture of cottage cheese, sour cream, cooked eggs, yogurt, and mayonnaise.
Cooking Tip: Food slides easily from the surface of a nonstick skillet, so little fat is needed for cooking.
Cooking Tip: When using defrosted phyllo or strudel leaves, cover the leaves that are not being used with damp toweling or plastic wrap to keep them from drying out.
Cooking Tip: When egg whites are to be folded into another mixture, they are beaten to soft peaks only, as this softer consistency will allow them to be folded into a stiffer mixture without deflating and releasing the air that had been carefully beaten in.
Cooking Tip: The best way to tell if a pineapple is ripe it to thump the side with the flick of a finger. A ripe pineapple will give a dull thud.
Cooking Tip: Beer batter will fry criper and lighter if allowed to stand awhile before mixing. This gives the flour granules time to soften and absorb the liquid.
Cooking Tip: Turmeric can be substituted for the more expensive saffron in recipes. The taste will be slightly different, but the color will be just as golden.
Cooking Tip: For relaxed get-togethers dips and dunks make a good choice for appetizers. Choose a dip that is not so stiff that it will break a chip or cracker. Crisp vegetables are excellent choices for stiffer dips.
Cooking Tip: To be sure your yeast is alive, mix it with a bit of sugar while it is dissolving in very warm water. If the yeast has not started to bubble within ten minutes it is no longer active.
Cooking Tip: To tell if an egg in the refrigerator is raw or hard-cooked, spin it on the countertop. If it is hard-cooked it will spin easily.
Cooking Tip: Small, delicate greens (watercress, mint, etc.) will keep best if stored in small, individual plastic containers with covers snapped firmly in place.
Cooking Tip: It's a cinch to retrieve all the grated citrus rind from the pore of the grater if you brush it out with a pastry brush.
Cooking Tip: Orange zest is often used in recipes for its elusive and delicate flavor. When using orange rind, take a vegetable parer and pare off the thin bright orange part of the rind that holds the flavorful oils.
Cooking Tip: When measuring shredded cheese, let it fall lightly into the measuring cup - do not pack firmly. One pound shredded cheese equals four cups.
Cooking Tip: For a soft crust on freshly baked white or whole-wheat bread, brush the warm crust with softened butter.
Cooking Tip: For biscuits with softer sides, place them in the pan with their sides barely touching.
Cooking Tip: To ripen tomatoes put them in a shallow box or bowl and slip into a brown paper bag. Close then end and leave at room temperature.
Cooking Tip: To make extra-light, airy pancakes, separate the eggs and mix the yolks into the batter first. After everything else has been added, beat the whites until stiff and fold them in at the end.
Cooking Tip: For a crunchy, sugary crust on muffins, sprinkle white or brown sugar over the batter in the muffin pan before baking.
Cooking Tip: If you have trouble with gummy rice, cook it like spaghetti. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add the rice and boil until tender.
Cooking Tip: For more flavorful rice, substitute chicken broth, beef broth, consomme, or undiluted tomato juice for the water.
Cooking Tip: A tablespoon of vinegar added to water before poaching eggs helps keep the whites from spreading.
Cooking Tip: Vary the shapes, colors, and textures of vegetables. For example, mashed potatoes make a nice contrast to Brussels sprouts, or green beans to carrots.
Cooking Tip: Almonds are good for you; 1 cup of them contains more calcium than 1 cup of skim milk. They are high in fiber too.
Cooking Tip: Potatoes boiled and baked in their skins retain nearly all their vitamins and minerals. Halving or peeling causes nutrient loss.
Cooking Tip: Romaine lettuce is greener than iceburg lettuce and has about three times as much vitamin C and six times as much vitamin A as iceburg lettuce.
Cooking Tip: When cooking a hot cereal, use skim milk as part or all of the liquid and you'll greatly improve the nutritional value.
Cooking Tip: Instead of handling each potato to butter or oil its skin when baking a lot of them, line up potatoes on paper towels and spray them with vegetable-oil spray.
Cooking Tip: A fork or wire whisk is the best implement to stir thick, condensed canned soups.
Cooking Tip: Powdered sugar in a shaker is handy for sugaring funnel cakes, doughnuts, or French toast.
Cooking Tip: To make one cup of sour milk for a recipe, add 1 tablespoon lemon juice or vinegar to enough milk to make one cup.
Cooking Tip: If you have a small grease fire on the stove, turn off the stove and douse it with baking soda.
Cooking Tip: The most tender pork chops are those with pink rather than red meat. Chops with red meat are from older, tougher animals.
Cooking Tip: Before returning an opened carton of ice cream to the freezer, press plastic wrap onto the surface of the ice cream to prevent ice crystals from forming.
Cooking Tip: Place fresh ginger root in a plastic bag and store it in the freezer. It will keep for months. Just grate the amount you need and return it to the freezer.
Cooking Tip: Drop dollops of whipped cream onto a cookie sheet and freeze, Transfer them to plastic bags and return to freezer. They'll thaw in 20 minutes.
Cooking Tip: You can peel oranges quickly and separate the sections cleanly if you cover them with boiling water. Let them stand for 5 minutes. Then drain, cool, and peel.
