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I was going to make some curry puffs following this recipe, in which some "meat curry powder" is used to flavor the fillings. I was just gonna use the regular store-bought curry powder I can find in my local supermarket, but then I started wondering if there is a significant difference between what I have and what is used in the recipe. The mention of "meat curry powder" in the ingredient list may suggest that it is a particular brand of curry which is especially suited for meat? As you can see from the images below, there is a slight color difference between the two at the very least. Can someone with experience of Malaysian or similar cooking let me know if there is something in particular I should pay attention to when choosing the spices for the fillings? The curry powder depicted in the recipe: The curry powder I wanted to use

Store brands of curry powder sold here in the UK (and I assume most western countries) don't usually contain chilli powder at all. Chilli is generally added separately to taste, because many westerners can't handle the heat of a hot curry mix. The typical yellow colour of these mixes is because they contain turmeric. However it looks like the Malaysian curry mix in the photo does contain chilli. After looking at the bright red colour, perhaps it contains Kasmiri chilli powder which is very red, but quite mild, or perhaps it even has red food colouring in it. Chilli powder alone doesn't make a curry, it needs the other spices commonly found in curry mixes such as, corriander, cumin, clove, cinnamon, black pepper, fenugreek, etc, etc. When I want to make my curry extra red, I use Kashmiri chilli powder together with either regular curry powder or garam masala. It not only has a wonderful vivid red colour, but it's fairly mild and yet still flavourful, so I can afford to put more in the curry without making it totally inedible. I have had a couple of Malaysian curry mixes given to me by a friend, and when I checked the ingredients I did notice food colouring was an ingredient, also their curries also have a distinctive star anise/fennel seed taste, so it might be worthwhile adding these spices too, if they aren't in your store bought curry mix.

My crockpot roast beef has the best aroma ever but the flavor of the finished product is only average. I had a 4 pound tri-tip roast and seasoned it with the usual onion, garlic, worcestershire sauce, cumin, basil, beef gravy packet, and enough beef broth to just cover roast in the crockpot. We walked in the door and the delicious aroma filled the whole house. But, when eating the roast, it was just okay. Lots of delicious aroma but very little flavor in the roast beef. Why is this?

If we're talking about a solid, four pound cut of beef - the only flavor you're ever really going to get is on the exterior and just a little bit into the interior of the meat. That said, cooking in the spices/components you list still may provide liquid gold. I would simply take some of the liquid that's leftover in the slow cooker after the roast has cooked and make a gravy out of it. You'll get the flavors you put in and have something to sauce the interior of the meat - that have been flavored with the juices of the meat as well. Otherwise, if you're looking to 'infuse' more flavor into the beef itself, you'll need to consider something like a stew rather than a whole cut.

So was recently thinking about the beer cooler sous vide method and had a thought: While heating the water to put in the beer cooler, if you were to place an object with a high heat capacity (e.g. a ceramic coffee cup) in the water, heat both to the desired temperature and then place them in the beer cooler, would that help keep the water at a more constant temperature? In other words, since you are replacing some of the water with a material at a higher heat capacity at the same temperature that would in turn keep the rest of the water warmer for a longer period, correct?

Water has one of the highest heat capacities available: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_capacity#Table_of_specific_heat_capacities Your ceramic is not going to hold nearly as much heat as the water bath itself. If you are finding that your bath is cooling too quickly then you are better off investigating your cooler.

How do you mix corn starch slurry and how do you use it? Do you add the corn starch to the water, or do you add water to the corn starch? Generally what proportions do you need, what is the ratio of water to cornstarch? Do you need to use more slurry to thicken more liquid; if so, what is the quantity per volume?

When making the slurry, stir cornstarch into cold water until it has the consistency of cream. This can be set aside until it's needed, but be sure to stir it briefly before you pour it into the sauce to redistribute the starch granules in the water. You should pour it into your sauce toward the end of its preparation. According to McGee you should use roughly 2/3 as much starch as you would flour. If you aren't using a recipe, add your slurry a bit at time until it's a thick as you like it. Also remember that the sauce will thicken a bit as it cools, so it should be a little bit thinner on the stove than you intend to serve it.

Among family, I have found radically different approaches to reheating food that has already been fully cooked. Some will not eat last night's leftovers unless they have been microwaved to the point where every single part of the food is piping hot. Said people consider food that is "cold in the middle" dangerous. Others are happy as long the the meal is sufficiently warmed for it to be safe to eat. This gives me my question. Why do leftovers need to be reheated before they can be eaten? Is it just for pleasure or is there an actual safety benefit?

The primary reason for reheating is just that warm food is more pleasant to eat. How warm, that is a personal preference - and stirring or heating longer can ensure more throughout heating. Reheating does weaken and kill pathogens. However, properly stored food should not have a dangerous amount of pathogens to start with. And some pathogens can either tolerate high temperatures or excrete toxins that are not destroyed by heat. Thus reheating food that already has a high amount of pathogens is only partially effective. Heating before cold storage is much more effective, as the pathogens do not get the chance to grow in the first place.

I add chopped onions, garlic, grated carrots, some flour and spices to pre-soaked TVP. Onions add a bit of texture but after baking tvp densifies becoming like soft rubber. I think mushrooms, beans, corn and peas can make it more texturized but I'm not a big fan of all those ingredients. Anything else you can think of?

Variants of tofu skins are great for meat-like textures. If you look up chinese buddist cooking or monastery cuisine, you will find many imitated meat and poultry dishes that are often called "vegan duck roast", "vegan abalone" etc (probably by non-practising consumers). One of the best for this is dried tofu skin sticks (not promoting the seller, just a random search result for a picture). Fried tofu skins pockets and pressed tofu also work pretty well. You will need to cut them into tiny shreds or chop them up coarsely to get the effect. These ingredients have plenty of surface area and are great at taking up seasoning and sauces to mimic meat juices.

I just ate a store bought roti (a flat Indian bread, like a tortilla) and baking powder is a listed ingredient. Why does a flat bread need baking powder? There are no bubbles to grow, are there?

I would say that recipes technique sounds ok, but when I have cooked duck before I have always cooked skin side down on a medium heat till the fat all runs out and skin is golden but this always takes longer than 3 minutes more in the 10 minute range. Maybe this is because I use a lower heat. the recipe doesn't say how hot the pan should be. The aim is to render most of the fat out from under the skin of the duck. I usually baste with the fat whilst it is cooking then finish off under the grill (broiler - not underneath the BBQ :)), but some times finish in the oven too.

I recently acquired a chef knife. Alton Brown says I should never use a glass surface to cut, but when I need to cut chicken I don't want to use the wood block because it will be contaminated. how do I go around this conundrum? What should I use to cut chicken with my new knife?

I believe that there are two major options: Wood cutting boards Plastic cutting boards Either of these will provide a perfectly appropriate surface for you to use your knives against. From a food safety point of view, both can be excellent, although they have different pros and cons. There is some evidence that wood cutting boards actually inhibit pathogen growth. They can be sanded down for maintenance, and sanitized with a light bleach solution, but should not be placed into the dishwasher, which may be an inconvenience for your lifestyle. Some larger wood cutting blocks are also a very nice aesthetic statement. Plastic cutting boards can be very effective, and can be placed in the dishwasher, and are easy to sanitize. Some people are concerned that once they get deep cuts within them, this can harbor pathogens even through cleaning cycles, so they have a limited lifetime. They also are not as pretty as wood, although often far lower in cost. Most sanitation guides will recommend that you reserve one cutting board for meat (or in a large kitchen, one for meat, one for poultry, and one for fish), and another for vegetables. This is often easiest with color coded cutting boards, which plastic makes easy. My personal preference is for the very thin, flexible plastic cutting boards. They are inexpensive, easy to move around, dishwasher safe, and can be rolled up to easily dump the product into a pot or container. They may not have an infinite lifespan, but they are very inexpensive. Since you do not wish to use your good cutting block for chicken, I recommend the thin, flexible style of cutting board--you can use your block for vegetables, bread, and so on.

I have a recipe that calls for "Cooking Chorizo" (in the UK). What is this? Would normal cured chorizo be an acceptable substitute?

Spanish Chorizo comes in two forms both of which to the best of my knowledge are fully cured (cooked): one which is more for eating on its own (like salami) and the other which tends to have a higher ratio of fat in it and is used primarily for cooking. The latter one being what the recipe is referring to as "cooking chorizo". Oftentimes the cooking chorizo is in a paper casing that must be removed (unless you need some extra fiber in your diet). Either one of these would work, however you might need to add a little oil to the pan if you need to cook other things in the fat that would normally be rendered out. Mexican chorizo is always a raw product which must be cooked and is usually in a plastic casing.

I picked up a pork sirloin roast yesterday, it's a little over three pounds. I've never cooked one of these before and I am not sure what to do. My seasoning plan is salt, pepper, thyme, and rosemary, and I might poke a couple holes for cloves of garlic as well. My cooking plan is 8+ hours in the crock pot on low, with about an inch of water in there. Will this turn out OK? I'd like a tender and moist result, obviously. Any tips would be greatly appreciated.

I don't think a pork sirloin roast will stand up to that kind of cooking very well. That is a very lean piece of meat, which does not lend itself to long cooking times at low temperatures. That type of cooking is best reserved for cuts of meat with lots of fat and/or connective tissue. If you put a pork sirloin roast in your cooker for 8 hours on low, you're going to have one tough, dry piece of meat when you are through. You would be better served by cooking it in the oven at higher heat, for a relatively short period of time, like 400F for an hour or so. Bear in mind, you're not going to get to a fall-apart tender state with a sirloin roast. This isn't a pork butt with which you're dealing, which you'd take up to an internal temperature of 195F or more. Rather, you're going to want to target the safe temperature, and no higher. You want the meat to be juicy. Cut into thinner slices to achieve maximum tenderness.

Recently I have been making white sauce by: heating the milk in a pan until nearly boiling mixing corn flour with a small amount of cold milk removing milk from stove add corn flour mix to hot milk stir until thick. This is very fast and never produces lumps, but what are the disadvantages versus using the traditional roux approach?

If it works for you (you like the results), there really isn't a disadvantage unless you have leftovers. Cornstarch (cornflour) thickened sauces tend to thin upon reheating more than roux thickened sauces. Depending upon what you are making, you may or may not notice it much if at all.

I'd like to make an exhaustive list of the various animals whose milk humans drink. Here's the ones I can think of: human cow goat sheep camel yak buffalo donkey/ass Any others? If so, where?

Add to this answer... Who and where, what it tastes like, how it differs, how it's used in cooking... Human Where: Worldwide Uses: Nursing Cow Where: Most common source of dairy worldwide Uses: All dairy products (milk, cheese, yogurt, etc.) Goat Where: India, Bangladesh, Africa, France, common across Europe. Uses: Milk, cheese Sheep Where: Across Europe Uses: Primarily cheese Camel Where: Middle East Uses: Milk Note: Camel milk can be an important source of water in extremely arid climates or survival situations. The milk can have a salty taste due to camels' high consumption of sodium. Yak Where: South East Asia, Mongolia, Northern China, Tibet, Nepal Uses: Milk, Cheese, and butter; localized dairy products such as dahi, paneer Water Buffalo Where: India, Parts of the Middle East, Southeast Asia, China, South America, Europe (best known in Italy and throughout the Balkan states) Uses: Milk, yogurt, cheese (mozzarella and others), candy Note: Water Buffalos are the 2nd most common source of dairy in the world. Horse Where: Mongolia Uses: Kumis (lightly alcoholic fermented drink) Donkey / Ass Where: Mediterranean countries Uses: Milk, yogurt, cosmetic and medical use Reindeer / Caribou Where: Scandinavian countries, Mongolia Uses: Cheese, Butter Note: Reindeer milk is 22% butterfat and produces extremely rich cream cheese which Lapplanders sometimes use in coffee rather than regular cream. Moose Where: Russia and Sweden Uses: Milk, limited cheese production

So I left some grape juice out overnight, I forget how long, but now it has developed a "fizzy" taste. Also when you open the bottle you can hear the fizz escape. I've put it back in the refrigerator, is it still safe to drink? It tastes okay.

I'd be very wary of this, if only because it seems to have fermented remarkably quickly. The fizz is likely the result of carbon dioxide being produced by yeast eating the sugars in the grape juice; this is the same process that carbonates beer or sparkling wines. The thing is, most of these yeasts are introduced deliberately, and they take a while to do their job. In my experience with home brewing, it would generally take at least a few days for the yeast to begin producing significant carbonation. If you truly did just leave this out overnight and it's already noticeably carbonated, that seems to be a very aggressive or efficient strain of yeast. Since it's impossible to know for sure, the safe thing to do would be to throw it out. Wild fermentation of this kind is used to produce certain beer styles, and other fermented goods such as sauerkraut, so it's not unsafe by definition. I would exercise caution here only because that level of carbonation seems very unusual to me, and grape juice is unlikely to be precious enough to justify the possible hazard.

I have this "spatula". The split in it perplexes me. It was inherited from a roommate who left it behind after moving out. It has a partner, that is a bigger spatula/flipper, with a hole in the middle. While the hole is large enough to be occasionally annoying, there doesn't seem to be anything abnormal about it. Based on the shape of the handle (and compared to the other (not pictured) spatula), the surface in the photo would be the "top".

Those could be a salad set, similar to this one. The two "spatulas" might be combinable to form a set of tongs. Update: Salad sets generally contain a forky and a spoony component, which may or may not be combinable (and there are e.g. combinable pairs of spatulas). On the other hand, shapes vary widely, and there are two-spoon and two-fork sets, and maybe whoever designed this wanted to create a multipurpose tool (considering the straight lower edge).

Are there any thermometers that you can put in clay ovens, or under a broiler? Most of the thermometers have a temperature limit of 350 ~ 400 degrees. I actually burnt one down last year by turning the broiler on by accident.

You'll want a commercial oven or high heat thermometer. This one goes to 750° F (about 400 C): My Big Green Egg Temperature Gauge goes up to 750° F (about 400 C). But if I want to monitor the internal temperature of what you are cooking in a hotter oven/broiler, I usually use a remote thermometer which has an all-metal wire and probe:

I have recently gotten into making my own soft drinks, and I would like to attempt making a cola. I found an online spice retailer that sells Kola Nut and bought some, but I have no real idea how to prepare them for use. I also don't know how much I should use for a liter or two of soda, but I can figure that out via experimentation if I have to. But what should I do with the kola nuts? Do they need to be ground before I boil them in a simple syrup, or should the pieces just be dropped in as-is? How much time does it take to extract the flavor from them? Edit: I have made my own ginger ale using fresh ginger and my own berry soda using a bag of frozen berries, and I am a homebrewer and have a kegging system and a carbonator cap for soda bottles. I really just want to know if there are special considerations for how to treat kola nuts.

Full disclosure — I'm not Vietnamese :-) The word "pho" (actually "Phở") is a corruption of the French word "feu", as in "Pot au Feu", the dish that it can claim as its ancestor. (That's from a Smithsonian Magazine article about Vietnamese food from sometime in the past few years.) It's a stock-based brothy soup, usually with at least onions and rice noodles and often (by customer choice) one or more meat additions. Sometimes the meat is added raw to the boiling hot soup immediately before serving. The dish is almost always served with a side platter of fresh herbs, bean sprouts, sliced-up chiles, and lime. The herbs are usually something like mint, Thai basil, and cilantro (or equivalent). It's not a super-fancy dish, and to my knowledge there's no International Phở Licensing Board, so the rules as to what is and isn't "correct" are probably pretty loose. I've had an awesome veggie-broth Phở, for example.

What can I substitute for oil in brownies and still get fudgy brownies? I've tried yogurt and sour cream (individually) and only replacing half the oil with one of those, but the brownies always end up cakey. Should I just give up and accept that brownies are not a health food, or are there other ways to use less oil?

If you have a recipe that already produces a dense fudgy brownie and you're looking to do it without oil, you're just out of luck. If you're looking to produce a dense fudgy brownie and wondered if, while you were at it, you might cut back on the oil...NO, but here are some suggestions for making a cakey brownie more dense and "fudgey": Follow Tim's advice above on using butter instead of oil. It's not doing anything as far as calories but it will produce better flavor vs. a neutral oil. However, particularly if you're planning to put nuts in them, you could replace a portion of the vegetable oil with walnut or hazelnut oil for enhanced nutty flavor. Replace half of the whole eggs with egg yolks. Cakiness in brownies is partly due to the use of whole eggs. Egg whites have a drying effect on baked goods. In converting a brownie recipe I did, I used 2 egg yolks for each whole egg. Replace part of the granulated sugar with corn syrup. They hygroscopic nature(ability to absorb moisture and retain it) of the corn syrup will create a more dense moist result. I think I replaced about half the sugar with corn syrup. The added moisture of the corn syrup will help to off-set the loss of moisture from removing the egg whites. Method/Technique: Heat chocolate, butter, cocoa powder over a hot water bath until chocolate is melted. Stir to blend to a smooth consistency. Set aside to cool slightly. Beat egg yolks/whole egg with sugar and corn syrup until thick, light in color, and mixture forms a "ribbon". Combine dry ingredients and make a well in the center. Temper chocolate into egg/sugar mixture. Mix to blend well. Add to dry ingredients and fold together just until moistened. Pour into greased pan and bake until set.

I want to know what is the minimum time required to soak oats to make them overnight oats. Now a days it’s Ramadan and I have very tight schedule on which I get 2-3 hours to eat. I wanted to know how much time is minimum required for overnight oats?

I learned, long ago, that when a recipe calls for "overnight" it means eight to ten hours and sometimes twelve. The range depends on what you are soaking. Sometimes eight is enough and sometimes longer is needed because the ingredients are a variable that may not be consistent. So the oats need to be tested. If eight hours is enough then eight hours it is. If not, you need longer.

What's the most effective way to de-grit clams and mussels? Apparently there are 3 possibilities. Salt only. Cornmeal only. Salt and cornmeal. Has any academic peer reviewed or researched this? This blog tested just with or without cornmeal: After 24 hours and 4 water changes, I steamed them in separate pots. The first batch (sans cornmeal purge) had significantly more sand in their bellies and shells and the pot in which they were cooked than the second (with cornmeal purge) batch, but they still tasted of the sea.  The clams in the second batch were lighter in color, plumper, and notably sweeter than the sea.

I think salty water is a given in purging, and the article you shared is no exception to this. Quoting directly You need lots of water—about 1 gallon of water and 1/3 cup of kosher salt per 1 dozen clams—that should be changed several times over 48 hours in order for them to be squeaky clean I think salt and cornmeal can be used complementarily. As it’s mentioned in the article cornmeal will alter the taste, but it will also expedite the purging (from 48h to 24h per the experiment in the article). It looks like using both is a better option than just using salt. And assuming salt should always be present in the water, I would rule out the only cornmeal option.

I like cooking a lot of stir-fry which I generally cook in a wok at high temperature. I generally use vegetable oil but I've also heard peanut oil is better for wok cooking because of it's high smoking point. Is peanut oil the best option for wok cooking or are there better oils to use?

Frying in a wok doesn't necessarily imply a single particular oil for all foods you cook. It may vary up to the ingredients, the technique (yes, there is more than one wok technique), the recipe, personal preferences, price etc. As a general rule, as you've mentioned in your question, wok techniques require relatively high temperatures so oils with reasonably high smoking points should be preferred, for sure. Depending on its type and the temperature you want to reach, peanut oil may be or may not be suitable for the task. This table and this list reveals that peanut oil is not the one with the highest smoking point and there are significant differences between the smoking points of the types of peanut oils. As a result, I don't think that a "best oil" can be named, but I believe -some type(s) of- peanut oil would be fine for many purposes --and it is a must for some recipes. Still, some other oils can be used in the light of what I mentioned above. For example, I prefer sunflower oil in many cases.

I've a friend who is allergic to egg protein, and my wife inadvertently raved about my chocolate mousse to her, causing some food borne awkwardness that I'd like to erase with an eggless mousse. I've done some experimenting though, and I'm not happy with the results. Can anyone think of a substitution that would hold air and provide the light mousse-y texture, but not be an egg? Can't be corn-based either, due to an additional corn allergy.

Try Hervé This's chocolate Chantilly. Water plus chocolate. Quite stunning.

As a recent resident of Southern California, I noticed in a supermarket very impressive looking sirloin strip steak for $4.99 per pound. Regular prices in other markets range from 10.99 to 29.99. The beef at this incredible price is from Mexico. Is this beef safe? Does anyone has experience with the quality of Mexican beef?

Exporting meat into the United States is not a simple or easy matter. From the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS): Checklist for Importing Meat, Poultry and Processed Egg Products This checklist is provided as an overview of the steps needed to be taken when you want to import meat, poultry, or processed egg products to the United States. Products must originate from certified countries and establishments eligible to export to the United States. The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Services (APHIS) restricts some products from entering the United States because of animal disease conditions in the country of origin. For information on restrictions related to animal diseases and information about APHIS, contact the APHIS Veterinary Services, National Center for Import and Export. Countries and establishments become eligible following an equivalence determination process by FSIS. Imported products must meet the same labeling requirements as domestically-produced products. After filing the necessary forms for U.S. Customs and Border Protection, and meeting animal disease requirements of APHIS, all imported meat, poultry and processed egg products must be presented for inspection by FSIS at an official import establishment. Mexico is one of 33 countries that can legally export meat to the US. In Mexico there are 74 companies authorized to export to the US (As of May 3, 2017). USDA Source Also from the USDA Website: So, in the United States, beef from Mexico has been determined by the US Government to be as safe as domestic beef.

I like making sauces from scratch, starting with a roux. Today, I discovered there's no flour in the kitchen. A quick trip to the store is not possible. What could I use instead? (Note that my question is similar to but not the same as Flour alternatives for roux. I have no reason to avoid wheat flour; I just don't have any around.)

Technically, you can make roux with any starch and any fat, per Harold McGee. So use cornstarch or arrowroot or whatever you have. Just avoid something with strong flavor like cornmeal. Of course, the flavor and thickening properties will be those of the starch you use... And you probably don't want to make a brown roux with anything but flour because of the flavor difference.

I have some walnuts I found in the back of my cabinet that are probably 5 years old. The packaging says best if used by 2010. I tasted them and they taste alright, maybe a little tartish but I don't mind. I was wondering if walnuts and other nuts actually ever go bad considering that they are dry.

Yes, nuts are very fatty, and they will eventually go rancid— if this is the case, they will taste very poor. They can also dry out, or in more rare cases (especially if stored improperly) be infested with insects or molds. Generally, they should be good for six months to a year at their best flavor, depending on the variety (in the shell). Five years is a little long. I am not sure I would want to eat nuts that old.

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.

What are old ways to store milk without refrigerator. I boiled twice a day still it spoils.

You really just have to find a way to keep it cold. The only way to keep perishable food from spoiling is to keep it below 40F/4C. If you can't do that, you'll have to use it fresh. UHT milk may help with that, because it's shelf-stable before opening, so you may be able to get a larger number of smaller size ones that you can actually finish quickly after opening. There are some things you can make out of milk that have longer life at room temperature, but they're not really milk anymore. Boiling really can't fix this, because it doesn't kill everything, because the nasty stuff produced by bacteria can survive even if the bacteria dies, and because whatever's left (or whatever drifts in and recontaminates it) is just going to have a nice friendly environment to grow in after it cools back into the danger zone.

I want to make nut butter from soaked cashews or soaked pepitas. I am wondering what type of machine will get the smoothest product? I am currently using a food processor which is great for cashews but I'm wondering if I can do better. Other possibilities include a blender, nut butter machine, and some type of grinder (perhaps a wet grinder?).

It doesn't matter. Any pan that works on an induction hob will work for heating milk on it. And especially with the speed of induction, you will not notice much difference with different pans. By the way, there is no reason to want an especially conductive pan for heating milk. Milk burns easily on the bottom when heated too quickly, so being more heat conductive is more likely to be a liability. I have personally not seen copper pans being suggested especially for milk, the traditional milk-specific pans I've seen are either thin enamelled steel or special stainless water-bath gizmos with a whistle.

What is baking soda used for, and how much should be added?

Baking soda is used in cooking for two purposes: As a leavening agent, in order to make baked goods rise. It does this by reacting with acids in the batter or dough, and producing carbon dioxide gas. To soften beans during cooking, particularly chickpeas. The alkalinity of the soda helps the complex carbohydrates and fiber in some types of beans break down, allowing them to puree more smoothly. I can't answer "how much is added" unless I know what you're making.

Possible Duplicate: What do you do with left over tomato paste? I have many cans of tomato paste, and I just want to get some ideas about how to use them up.

Moka coffee pots work well if you use them every day. This way the oils that the coffee leaves inside them do not have the opportunity to go rancid (all fats go rancid eventually) and impart that horrible taste to your coffee. If you use them every day, it is true that you don't really need to clean them, except to remove calcium scale buildup. If you use it rarely, like in your case or the frequent Moka pot left at a vacation house, you need to clean it with dish detergent and a scrubby sponge, you don't need anything harsher. Make sure that you get all the coffee brown oils out. Yes, it is an unpleasant job. Make sure you rinse it well before putting it away to dry, you don't want to simply replace the bitterness with soapiness. ...and this is the Italian doctrine! :-)

There are many different coffee-based drinks on an average coffee-house menu. But what makes them different from each other? What are the differences / distinguishing characteristics between: latte, caffe misto, cappuccino, mocha, macchiato, Americano, and Cafe Au Lait?

Espresso: This is a finely ground very dark roast coffee, packed somewhat tightly in a special metal filter, with water "expressed" through it under pressure. A very strong dark coffee, typically served in 1-2 ounce portions. Very commonly incorrectly called "Expresso." Americano: Italians typically don't drink American Strength coffee. They drink espresso in tiny cups. Then the tourists came and wanted a mug of coffee like they get at home. The Italian solution was to make an espresso and keep the water running through the grounds to weaken the coffee, and make the desired quantity. (edit: Some locations may simply add hot water to the espresso in the cup. This doesn't change the basic concept.) An Americano is simply an espresso that has been drawn out with extra water to an American strength beverage -- Not to be confused with the typical brewed coffee, which is usually filtered. Caffe au Lait: This is strong filtered or brewed coffee (not espresso), with warmed milk. This is probably the easiest specialty coffee to make at home. Just scald some milk in a pot and pour it over strongly brewed coffee. Cappuccino: A 1:1:1 ratio of espresso, steamed milk, and milk foam. Typically the milk is steamed through a special high pressure steam pipe on the espresso machine. This serves two functions. To warm up the milk and to create a stiff foam on the top. When pouring, the foam is held back with a spoon, and then scooped out on top. I'll arbitrarily define the cappuccino as the base beverage for all that follow. Macchiato: Typically in North America, this is a cappuccino, but with the steamed milk component missing. That is, it is espresso and frothed milk foam only. Also called a "Dry" Cappuccino. Macchiato has different meanings elsewhere. Latte: A "wet" cappuccino. Hold back the foam with a spoon, and pour the warm milk over the espresso. Put a little bit of foam on top for decoration only. Mocha: Any one of the above espresso + milk drinks with chocolate added. Some places will add hot chocolate to the drink, others will add a chocolate syrup. A mocha latte is the common preparation. Not to be confused with Mocha beans, which are an Ethiopian coffee bean which has a little bit of a naturally occurring chocolate flavour. Misto: A Starbucks synonym for a Cafe au Lait.

Whenever I've cooked quiche, it's been in a round tin of around 10-12 cm diameter. I've used 5-6 eggs along with other ingredients like chicken and vegetables. After it comes out of the oven, I find that the height is low (around 2cm) when I thought/expected it to be higher. I find it hard to know when it's actually 'cooked' as the egg parts are runny when it's in the oven, only solidifying when I take it out. How can I tell that the quiche is done?

Butter in liquid state is more easy to mix and get an homogeneous batter. Given enough effort, creamed butter does the same thing. By effort, I mean making sure not to overlook tiny lumps of heterogeneous batter; otherwise the texture will be different. Also, if you are mixing the eggs with some lukewarm butter, it may be a health concern if you don't use the batter right away. If you had a crumbly cookie-like texture, then my first thought is that the ratio was not correct or something was missing.

So you've just cooked your creme caramels in a water bath/bain marie/double boiler with only about a quarter of the ramekin appearing above water level. I've tried the follow methods in the past and feel there must be a more efficient, more secure or less dangerous way: tea towel/oven mitt: not enough ramekin to grab onto without dipping the towel/mitt and your hands into boiling water. Tongs: very unstable grip, ramekin can easily slip. Lifting out with an egg flip: flips bends due to weight of ramekin. Scooping water out: too much manual labor, often awkward as little room to scoop from.

A true bain-marie actually has a fitted rack or platform that allows water through, which you can lift out with handles. It's very convenient. If you're just using a baking dish filled with water, I'd suggest getting yourself a mesh roasting pan with handles, like this one: Then you can put all your ramekins on top and just lift out the whole rack when you're done. If I don't have one of these on hand, I usually use a wide shallow bowl to scoop water out; you don't need to scoop it all out, just enough to firmly grip the top of the ramekins. Some silicone oven mitts might also help; they don't get "wet" like regular oven mitts and so they'll protect your hands from the hot/boiling water just fine.

I got a flat-bottomed iron wok a few weeks ago at a local Asian supermarket. I seasoned it on my electric stove, based on information I googled up: heated it up, put a thin layer of peanut oil on it, turned the heat down and let it sit for 15 minutes. This worked pretty well and formed a nice dark layer, but even after cooking in the wok a couple of times, I thought the seasoning could be better, so I decided to start over. I used soap and a sponge scourer to get most of the patina off. To get more off, vinegar seemed like a good idea, so I boiled vinegar and water in the wok for about five minutes, let it cool, and scraped most of the remaining patina off. The wok looked (almost) good as new, so I dried it and proceeded to re-season it. I applied my original seasoning procedure, which went well, but then the trouble started. I rinsed out the wok with hot water and rubbed it with a kitchen towel. In the center (where the metal gets the hottest, presumably), some of the patina stuck to the towel, and left iron-colored spots. I tried again twice, but the problem remained. I thought maybe cooking in the wok would build up some patina, so I stir-fried some vegetables. Then, I rinsed and wiped it, and unfortunately, black flakes came off again. I can't seem to keep the entire bottom covered in patina. So, any thoughts? Did I ruin my wok? Did the vinegar maybe form an oil-resistant layer or something? Anything I can try, or should I just get a new wok? Thanks.

You have overcooked the seasoning. I have done this once or twice too. Especially smooth surfaces (e.g. carbon steel) are very prone to this problem, unlike rough cast iron. What you want is not a dark layer. The layer will darken with time and start looking like usual. But on a freshly seasoned metal utensil, the layer should be yellow-brownish. The stove may be too hot for this, especially a gas stove, I do my pans in the oven, for maybe an hour at 200 Celsius or somewhat lower. A burner under thin metal can cause hot spots of much higher local temperature, where the oil chars instead of polymerising. There is also the type of oil you use. Generally, unsaturated oils polymerise easiest, but the final layer stays somewhat sticky. Saturated fat can give you some more trouble, but will have a smoother finish. I do multiple layers, starting with 1-2 layers of flaxseed oil - this gives a good basis, it is so unsaturated it can practically dry out by itself in the air - and finishing with cocos fat or lard, again 1 or 2 layers. For the first few time in a new pan, I try to fry with saturated fat too, for your wok you will probably find that the taste of cocos fat has a good harmony with Asian dishes. And a word to the cleaning before: Vinegar was not such a good idea. Woks are made from reactive metals (that's why they need seasoning) and metals react with acid. Using acid to clean naked reactive metal will result in invisibly small pockets of reaction products on the surface of the wok, mostly rust. You can do this as an early step in cleaning, but afterwards you have to use something to make sure you have removed this too. To peel off the seasoning before reseasoning, you are much better off using a base, as it does not react with the metal. This will ensure that the new seasoning sticks to the metal itself and not to impurities which can be dislodged over time.

What cut of beef should I use for a beef stew? I heard that you want a little bit of fat in the meat, but what part the animal is best to use?

Assuming a long, cooked stew. I cut up a well marbled chuck steak usually and chuck is what I'd recommend. You want enough fat that as the stew cooks long, the fat will render and leave nice, tender meat. Too lean and you're left with boiled shoe leather. If you want a quicker stew, use a leaner cut of meat like sirloin. It will have a lot of flavor but you shouldn't cook it long at all. A fatty cut in a short stew will end up very fatty and often tough (with a cheaper cut like chuck).

Since a few hundred million eggs have been recalled, I'm wondering how salmonella gets into eggs in the first place. Is it getting on the shells from the environment (or the hen)? Is it inside the egg? This is mostly a curiosity/science question, so please don't take it as fear mongering, FUD, or any such non-sense. I realize that many eggs are perfectly safe.

There are two basic mechanisms: the salmonella is on the shell and when the egg gets broken the interior gets contaminated; or the chicken's reproductive system is contaminated and lays an egg with contaminated interior. To reduce the very common (a few percent) shell contamination, eggs sold commercially have their shells treated (typically washed). After washing only about 50 in every million eggs will still have some shell contamination. The shell contamination may have been there when the chicken laid the egg, from fecal matter, or as a result of plant processing.   In some rare cases the surface salmonella can make it to the inside without breaking the egg: if it was there while the cuticle dried, if the egg is stored at room temperature, or if the environment is moist.   

I want to store some rice in a plastic bucket with a lid that I picked up at the hardware store. But the plastic bucket hasn't been cleaned out, and I don't know what is safe to clean it with given that we would eventually be boiling, but then eating the food. What cleaner would be safe to use on this? I thought bleach would do the trick but I'm not sure.

What, if anything, was in the bucket before? I prefer to stick with food grade buckets, most easily found from foodservice operations that get food in buckets. For those, hot water and baking soda are key for removing the smell of the previous food if it was smelly, after washing with soap for basic cleaning. i.e. olive kegs are handy, but I can wash them by hand repeatedly, in the dishwasher repeatedly, and still tell that they were olive kegs by sticking my nose in and sniffing. But a few iterations of hot water and baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) left to soak and they don't smell like anything any more. Also works for peppers, pickles, molasses and other odors that soak into plastic. A hardware store new empty bucket that wasn't used for anything, but which is not marked as food grade (such as the "fork and wineglass" symbol being molded into it) is probably OK for storing rice, but I would not use one for wet food storage (pickles, etc.) and would prefer a food-grade bucket even for rice, myself. A bucket that had non-food chemicals stored in it I would not use for food storage at all, no matter how well cleaned out it was, barring some sort of post-apocalyptic scenario where I could either starve or use a cleaned out paint or grease or detergent bucket to haul food in. Another option is to put the food in food-safe bags, and put the bags in the (non-food-safe) bucket for ease of moving and protection from damage, rodents, etc. The food only touches the bag, not the bucket.

I want to bake a cake in my gas cooking range, but I can't find any option to set the temperature. I just have the time setting knob and flame adjustable knob. How do I preheat my gas oven and long should I?

I agree with Jefromi that the easiest solution is just to get a cheap oven thermometer that you can put into the oven. I'm not sure where you're from or the availability of them, but they are generally quite cheap. Before such things existed, people had methods for testing oven temperatures for baking. The most common one was to put your hand into the oven and count how long it takes until it's too hot and you need to take it out. Depending on the number of seconds, you could tell the difference between a "hot" or "moderate" or "low" oven or whatever. Such distinctions are sufficient to determine oven temperature to bake a passable cake, but they require experience to achieve even basic precision. If you already knew how to do this, you could estimate the oven settings pretty quickly (though only in a general sense, but good enough for basic baking). But without that sort of previous experience, I'd again just recommend buying an oven thermometer.

I recently tried this recipe for Naan bread in an oven, and followed it diligently, but the product that came out did not have that characteristic flavor of Naan. It was more like a pizza bread without topping. Also, it was a bit puffier than the Naan they serve in restaurants, which is of a flat nature. Is the flavor that you get in an authentic Indian restaurant solely because of the clay oven? What can I do to improve this recipe? EDIT: Thanks for the answers. I tried the stove top method and although it charred, it did not give that flavor. It was more like overcooked roti :). Which makes me wonder how come roti and nan taste so different (they have similar recipes) EDIt#2: Some of you have suggested doing this on a bar be que grill. Can nan be done on an open campfire? That would be something!

The flavor you want is from the high heat of the clay oven (around 900F, much like a wood-fired pizza oven). Probably nothing you can do to truly replicate it at home, but here are some things to try: Use a pizza stone in the oven, and turn the oven to MAX, as hot as it will go (above 500F). Let it preheat for 45 min at least to get the stone to full heat. Put the dough right on the stone (either by hand - risky but traditional, or with a pizza peel or upside down sheet pan covered in corn meal). The naan will cook much quicker, maybe 3-5 minutes at most. If you can get the oven hot enough, you'll get a little of the "char" that is part of the flavor. After mixing the ingredients, let the dough rest overnight in the fridge. The next day, pull it out, let it warm to room temp and resume the proofing process. That will let more sugars be created from enzymes converting starch to sugar, and will slightly improve browning (part of the flavor you are looking for). Of course, if you want to get fun, you could look into one of the many tutorials on building a wood-fired oven in your yard. Lots of great baking to be had there, including a more traditional naan bread. For more tips, read up on all the things people do to their home ovens to bake better pizza - they will all apply to clay oven baking as well. Things like hearth inserts, faking out the "cleaning cycle" and other tips are common. Based on comments and some more thinking, my first recommendation would be a grill - charcoal if you have it, gas if you don't. The procedure would be similar to making grilled pizza (well described in Peter Reinhart's "American Pie"). Using a charcoal grill with hardwood charcoal, a dough that is stiff enough to not immediately slide through the grate on your grill (may mean slightly less water in your dough), and making sure to brush the surface of the dough with oil or ghee before flopping down on the grill, you could probably get even closer to the clay oven. It still isn't the same thing, but you might get more of the smoky charred flavors you seek.

This recipe calls for boiling Yukon gold potatoes with their skins on, then peeling them. I don't really know why, I just decided to follow it. I find that I am unable to peel boiled potatoes in any reasonable amount of time because they are soft, slippery, and very hot. I have tried: Sticking a fork in one end to hold it down as I peel. Cumbersome and potatoes generally split on the fork while I'm working. Holding the potato in my hand as normal. Result: 1st degree burns, 2nd if I'm really being stubborn. Wearing a silicone oven mitt. Cumbersome and mitt gits in the way. Let them cool. But this takes a long time and also, then they're cold... So, two questions: Anybody got any tricks for this? Why boil then peel, won't I get the same results if I just peel them before I boil them like I usually do when I need cooked, skinless potatoes?

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

I got a cut from an asian grocery store yesterday that was labeled as Pork Belly, but what I got is this: That's the top-down view; the cut is under an inch thick. There's a portion in the upper right that looks similar to the fat on pork belly. What would this cut be called, and when I'm cooking it should I look for inspiration in pork chop recipes, or pork belly recipes?

That looks like Pork neck or shoulder without a bone. The best way to prepare it is to grill it or bake.

How much pulled pork will 26 pounds (12 Kg) of raw boneless pork butt make? I am making this in several crock-pots. This is my first time making pulled pork for a large crowd

It depends on your portion size. If you figure a 6 oz portion and 45 - 50% loss on boneless pork butt (based on some internet research)...I would estimate that 26 lbs would feed around 35 people.

When making a fruit purée, specifically raspberry, to be used as a filling or a layer for cakes or chocolates, what is the proper way to do this? Should the berries be cooked? Should the cooking occur before or after straining the seeds? Should a food processor be used before removing the seeds? Should acid or sugar or pectin be added to the purée? How does this change for other fruits like strawberries? Blueberries?

The proper way is the one described in the recipe you are making. All of the variations you listed above will give you a fruit puree, for any berry (or even other fruit) you choose. The purees will of taste differently depending on how you make them, but none of them is somehow less "proper" than the other. It is the recipe author's job to choose a preparation method in which the puree's texture and taste harmonizes best with the rest of the recipe. So, just follow it, and you will get the intended result. There are two cases in what you listed in which the combination of preparation steps could be problematic (so if you see it in a recipe, you should choose another recipe). First, if you have small seeds (such as a raspberry or blackberry) and need a seedless puree, but use a bladed implement like a food processor or a blender before straining. In that case, you will most likely end up with sharp seed pieces that are left in after straining, defeating the purpose of a seedless puree. Second, thickeners need the correct conditions to work. As you listed pectin, you have to make sure that you are within the correct ratios of sugar and acidity for the type of pectin you are using, and you have to warm the puree to the needed temperature. With other thickeners, you have to again ensure that their requirements are met.

My slashes seem to be OK (not great) before I put the bread in the oven but never really open up during baking. I'm thinking the slashes aren't deep enough but since I use a no knead method, I'm reluctant to press any harder. Is there a trick to help the knife move more easily? I use a serrated knife.

Professional bakers use straight razors. Chances are they are sharper than your knife, and easier to keep that way (or cheaper to replace, at least). Also: wet the blade before making slashes. This helps lubricate the blade as it cuts, and keeps the cut bread from sticking.

Here is what I did: Heated 1 cup quinoa in olive oil for 1 minute after rinsing it. Added 2 cups water till it boiled. I set the heat to the lowest setting and closed it with a lid. After 15 minutes, the quinoa is still crunchy and the water has gone. If I let it stand for a few more minutes it gets burnt. I've tried this a few times and get same result - the quinoa is half cooked and inedible. What am I doing wrong? Note: I'm very new to cooking. About 3 weeks since I entered the kitchen.

As Sobachatina said, it's cooked like many grains, and behaves very similar to rice. You could try continuing the steaming method, and if it does not get done by the time all the water has turned to steam, start it with a bit more water. Sobachatina's suggestion of a tight lid is also worth considering, but pay attention to the pot then, so you don't get it boiling over. An alternative is to use a boiling method. With or without toasting it first, add 3.5 parts of water to 1 part quinoa. Cook until soft, and put through a sieve to discard the superfluous water. The upside is that, unless you are using too high a temperature, there is no way to burn it.

I asked a question about a "Wonder Pot" a bit ago, and this item came up on a search. I don't think it's a wonder pot though. The center hole is effectively much smaller, and there are not any vents in the lid. There isn't a "flame tamer" either, although this part may be lost. I keep seeing cookware like this in thrift stores, and I'm pretty sure it's for one specific task. What might that task be?

This one had me scratching my head for a while. I came across the phrases "stovetop oven", "raised center skillet", "steamer pan" and a bunch of other dead-ends. Well, I finally stumbled onto "Ultimate Dutch Oven": Looks familiar, doesn't it? This one is cast iron, but what you've found is clearly a non-stick version of the same thing. It's sold as camping gear. The raised center in the middle is what they call a "convection cone". Presumably it's meant to emulate a convection oven (inefficiently, I might add, since there's no fan) - the vents in the cone are a means of distributing the heat, to help mitigate the usual skillet problem of the bottom being overcooked while the top is still raw. I'm pretty sure that nothing is actually supposed to go "inside" the cone, other than hot air. It's probably fairly effective if you're cooking over an open flame (i.e. extremely hot air). A 3" high non-stick version of this would seem to be of pretty limited use. I can imagine trying to make "baked" potatoes in there, or maybe pre-butchered chicken parts? As you can see from the link above, the "full-size" version can hold a couple of small birds, and again, it's cast iron, so it's infinitely more useful for outdoor cooking.

I have a box of raisins in my cabinet that have been there for many years. Should I discard them or can they still be salvaged for use in baking or cooking?

I just found a pack of Sun-maid that were dated 05 04 00. Opened them up & tried a couple , not too bad . And not hard at all.

Tonight I tried to make some butter from some raw cows milk. I followed the instructions here, and let the cream I skimmed off a gallon of milk sit for about 24 hours to "culture." It didn't really smell "slightly sour" yet, but as I had already gone twice the prescribed time, I decided to move on anyway. I divided the cream between two quart jars, and shook them for about 20 minutes each, as described, and although solid clumps formed in each jar, there was no yellow tint. So I transferred the contents of each jar into a mixing bowl, and used an electric mixer, per the instructions here, but it made no real difference, except to move the stuff around, so I finished off the batch by straining the butter milk from the solids, rinsing the butter under cool water, and adding a little salt. The final result looks like this: In the silver bowl is the finished "butter", in the bowl to the right, the strained off buttermilk, and I'm holding a stick of store-bought butter (Ingredients: Cream, Natural Colors) for color comparison. This "butter" tastes okay, but doesn't have much of a buttery flavor. It is is also the whitest "butter" I have ever seen. But is it really butter, or did I make something else? To get "normal" yellow butter that tastes butterier, what should I do differently?

It's not hard: First milk cow :-), then let the milk settle in the fridge for a day or two. Skim the cream off the top Use a food processor, or hand shake in a cocktail mixer or similar sized jar (only about a 100 ml at a time) First you get whipped cream (2 to 5 minutes), then another minute of shaking and suddenly butter appears It should separate very cleanly, with watery whey (save for soft cheese making), and lots of rough yellowish fat globules. If it still looks smooth it needs more shaking If you want to keep the butter for any length of time you will need to wash it a few times with clean water, and squeeze the water out of it after each wash The colour you get depends on what your cows have been eating. It can be quite white There is no need for heating, or any other additives

I have a recipe for long, slow, braised pork chops. I make them the same way every time. I buy 1 inch chops on the bone. Sometimes they come out incredibly tender and sometimes dry and stringy. I know it has to do with fat content as the dry ones have very little fat to skim from the sauce. But I can not discern from the raw meat, which is fattier. I buy center cut chops. The recipe calls for blade chops, but stores don't always have that. Help?

The resulting quality of a braise has to do with the connective tissue rather than the fat. Your recipe calls for the blade chop because it is close to the shoulder, which is tougher and contains more connective tissue. This tissue is tough to start, but braising breaks it down into a gelatin and makes the meat tender (and juicy). When you pick your chops, look for thin lines white connective tissue throughout. Or, just use a pork shoulder. Also, remember to let the meat cool in the braising liquid. (Not to room temperature, but to an edible temperature). As the meat cools, it draws in some of the liquid and prevents it from drying out.

I was wondering why a portafilter coffee machine takes up to 15 minutes to warm up in order to make an espresso. On the other side, a modern Nespresso Citiz doesn't even take a minute to warm up. What makes the difference here?

By portafilter I assume you mean the standard large coffeeshop espresso machine. The Nespresso is only heating enough water for a single shot, which can be done pretty quickly. I'm pretty sure commercial machines take a long time for that first shot because they're preheating the large reservoir so it's possible to fully heat and pull shot after shot in fairly quick succession once you get going. So the lag is because the bigger machine is heating a bunch more water--even if it doesn't superheat any more per shot than the Nespresso. Somebody correct me if I have this all wrong, but that's what I was led to understand.

I've read that escargot can be a carrier of parasites (Angiostrongylus cantonensis) or bacteria that can lead to meningitis. I assume there are no visible signs if they are in fact carriers. Will the boiling process make escargot safe to eat if they are? I assume it's just a matter of time and temp but I want to be sure I'm not missing something.

I think you're a bit unclear what meningitis is. It isn't something like smallpox or salmonella, which are caused by a specific pathogen. Meningitis stands for an inflammation of the membranes covering the brain surface, and it can be caused by a number of pathogens. There is bacterial meningitis, viral meningitis, parasitic meningitis, and even meningitis where it isn't possible to find out what caused it. As such, it is just wrong to say that a food can be a "meningitis carrier". If you want to say that every organism contaminated with a pathogen which can potentially cause meningitis is a "meningitis carrier", then everything is a meningitis carrier, including the lips of your significant other. If a significant proportion of contacts with a "meningitis carrier" lead to meningitis, humanity would have died out before it discovered fire. So first, you can't react to such news as to a statement like "escargot can carry salmonella". Second, if "meningitis carrier" was the real wording of your source, this is a red flag for its credibility. If the material which you read says that "escargot is sometimes contaminated with bacterium X, which has been known to cross the blood brain barrier in a big percentage of infected people and cause meningitis", you should look up the combinations of time and temperature required for a 6-log10 reduction of this bacterium (the USDA publishes such data) and make sure that this temperature has been maintained at the core of the food for at least the time indicated. Just throwing into boiling water and waiting isn't enough, because you don't know when the core of the food reaches the temperature prescribed. If your source doesn't mention the type of pathogen, you can't assume that boiling will kill it. There are bacteria on Earth which proliferate in hot geysers, and while it is unlikely that they can both live in escargot and cause meningitis, making the assumption that boiling can kill any pathogen is reckless. If the source was credible, you need to hunt more information, until you know which pathogen is meant, then follow the previous paragraph. If your source wasn't especially credible, something like a tabloid saying "A child ate escargot and landed in hospital with meningitis! We will all die with our brains converted to swollen puss if we eat escargot!!!", then it was some common pathogen which happened to somehow reach a victim's brain in a single case. Disregard the meningitis scare, look up the guidelines for cooking escargot, and stick to them in order to eliminate the common pathogens contained in it. edit: now you have updated your question, it was possible to do some research. The parasite was the easy one. This paper is used as a basis for the safety guidelines of some government organs, e. g. the public health agency of Canada: link. As it doesn't say how the 2-3 minutes are measured, I'd wait until the core of a snail is at 55°C, and measure at least 3 minutes after that (or more, for added safety). This will make you safe from the parasite infection, which sometimes causes meningitis (and is probably unpleasant even if it doesn't reach the brain). As for bacteria, I didn't find any special information about escargot or any kind of land snails. As all the mentions of escargot and meningitis together I found pointed to the parasite as a cause, there probably isn't an escargot specific bacterium which causes meningitis or other unusual illness. So the usual food safety guidelines apply. Sadly, the various food safety organs of different countries don't seem to have published specific guidelines for escargot (maybe the French have, but I don't speak French). You can use the guidelines for seafood, because for food safety purposes, escargots count as mollusks Foodsafety.gov is a good place to start for the home cook - even if you don't live in the USA, you can trust them to have chosen good guidelines. The FDA site also contains good information, it lists 145°F internal temperature for seafood, but, strangely, no time period.

I want to use up some chocolate I have on hand, and don't have enough of either one for the recipe I plan to use for truffles, so I thought I'd try combining the 3 chocolates. One is 54%, one is 63%, and one is 86%. Any suggestions or warnings would be appreciated! Thanks!

You're first melting it all and mixing it together, right? You can just compute the cacao contents of the resulting mixture. For that you'll need to weigh the three batches. Say the 54% batch is 200g, the 63% batch is 150g and the 86% batch is 100g. Then you have a total of 54% * 200g + 63% * 150g + 86% * 100g = 108g + 94.5g + 86g = 288.5g of cacao out of a total mass of 200g + 150g + 100g = 450g. So the resulting cacao percentage is 288.5 / 450 = 64%. Now just treat the mixture as you would 64% cacao chocolate (since that's what it is).

I'm making my own Pad Thai sauce and I'm not sure if I should strain out the tamarind pulp or if it can stay in the sauce. Or is there some type of prepared tamarind which dissolves into the sauce so there's nothing to strain?

It's essential to get all the debris(seeds, large fibrous bits, skins etc) out of the pulp. I normally add a little hot water in a bowl with the block of pulp, be careful not to add too much or it'll end up watery - better to add more as you go, wash your hands thoroughly and break the pulp up by hand. Then strain out the seeds etc and it's ready to use. You can buy ready to use Tamarind puree in shops but it's normally not a good. There's more info on working with Tamarind pulp in the footnotes here(as well as a good Pad Thai recipe) http://chezpim.com/cook/pad_thai_for_beginners

Are the two the same? I have no clue. A brief google search didn't provide much help. Update: Here's an example of baking flour

The important phrase in the description of the flour you linked to is "all purpose". It's all-purpose flour, the middle of the road flour that's reasonably good for anything. They chose to throw in the word "baking" to emphasize that you can bake with it, presumably because it's a gluten-free version which is designed to work for baking. It has absolutely nothing to do with baking powder, a chemical leavener. Besides the fact that it says "all purpose flour" in the name, you can also tell from the fact that it comes in a six-pound bag, and the fact that the ingredients are all non-wheat flours.

This weird-shaped cake pan is difficult to use when it comes to the step that I must line it with parchment paper. How should I do it properly so that the cake will easily be removed from the pan?

You can't effectively line a Bundt pan with paper. My favorite method is to mix cake release and keep it in the cabinet. It lasts for months and months. Just mix 1 part vegetable oil, 1 part shortening and 1 part flour (roughly, by volume). Brush that mixture in the pan, getting all the nooks and crannies. It doesn't make the mess that traditional flouring does, I always end up getting flour everywhere doing it that way. I think the mixed ahead release works better too. It also doesn't show up on the cake as unmoistened flour. With your non-stick pan plus the cake release, you'll have no trouble. OXO makes a silicone pastry brush that's great for this and all kinds of tasks, I use mine all the time. It goes in the dishwasher, it's heat resistant, it doesn't shed. It's a very handy little item. Look for the strips of silicone in between the bristles with holes that hold on to sauce. You can see that in this picture using the magnification tool. OXO Pastry Brush

I have an All Clad stainless steel pot and I was cooking some soup In it. The timer went off to tell me to turn the heat off but I must have been daydreaming because I merely looked at the soup at that point and walked away from it again. Maybe about 15 minutes after that I noticed a strange smell and I realized I had kept the fire burning. There had been only a couple of cups of water to begin with so that was all burned off by now and the noodles were burning at the bottom of the pot. I was fortunately able to clean about 99% of the residue and debris off of it, thanks to some baking soda, vinegar, salt, and a lot of elbow grease. My concern is if I should still use the pot. Most of the Internet tells me it should still be fine and it was only 15 minutes and not an hour or anything. However, I'm a bit concerned because I stupidly had a similar incident a few years ago. At that time, I was boiling a pot of water and left it for 2 hours. (I know, bad). Though I tried to salvage that pot, the steel inside was definitely bubbling and buckling and when I tried to use it a few more times after that, it was making very unsettling, and very loud, snapping noises. Speaking to All Clad confirmed that the heat that long in the empty pot separated the layers inside (hence the very visible bubbling) and it was time to retire the pot. Though this situation is definitely different in that it was only over boiled for 15 minutes and there was still food inside this second pot, and I'm reluctant to throw away an expensive pot and it looks fine (though there’s some discoloration on the outside). However, I'm also reluctant to take a chance if perhaps there has been some similar layer separation inside due to the heat (that might be too slight to see), and if this could cause some danger. Thank you for any insight or thoughts!

First, I think you should maybe consider making better use of kitchen timers. The way to test whether you've damaged the pot is: Fill it around 2-3cm deep with water Turn on medium heat Do NOT walk away. Instead, watch and listen to the pot as it heats up If you've damaged the fit or bonding between the layers, you will hear pings and cracking noises as it heats up. If not, you won't. Remember to turn it off as soon as you've done the test.

Why do people suggest boiling rice before lowering the heat to low, when making steamed long grain rice? What happens if you don't wait for it to boil and go straight to simmer phase?

In cooking rice or many other grains (and even some grain based products such as pasta), two things actually happen: The starches absorb water; they are hydrated. Cooking. The boiling phase does both at the same time, very efficiently, but sufficient hydration happens before the rice is fully cooked through. So steaming to finish allows the rice to be fully cooked. If you just simmer, things would simply take longer. The reason to turn the heat down is to not burn the rice at the bottom during the steaming phase.

I am looking to make my own sweet potato fries, however sweet potatoes are harder to cut than regular potatoes. Even more expensive cutters such as the Nemco N554503 fry cutter are not recommended for cutting sweet potatoes. Does anyone know what makes a cutter suitable for sweet potato fries?

I have the Progressive International Jumbo Potato Cutter and it works well for sweet potato fries. The product spec for them lists "Yams" which are sometimes what sweet potatoes are called in the U.S. (technically, yes, yams are different but real yams are not often available in the U.S.). The LEM Products Commercial French Fry Cutter specifically lists sweet potatoes: Makes French fries, sweet potato fries, zucchini sticks and other favorites

Yesterday I decided to try to make dulce de leche or caramel. I did not follow a recipe: I was as curious to see what would happen as I was hungry for sweet, caramelised, milky sugar. I mixed semi-skimmed milk with a large quantity of white sugar in a saucepan and heated gently. The ratio was roughly 1:1 by volume. Within minutes (and long before the mixture was at all hot) smooth, silky shapes began to form in the mixture, which at this point was still roughly half milk and half undissolved sugar. The silky shapes soon coagulated and grew harder and chewier over time. The milk had obviously curdled. I haven't come across any other references to sugar curdling milk in this way. I have only seen it referenced as a 'stabiliser'. I assume that the curdling was made more likely by my milk's low fat content. I was not stirring constantly. But I'm not looking for a fix, just for understanding. I didn't really want to get it 'right'. So, could someone please explain what most likely happened here? Is it simply that milk heated with a high enough proportion of anything that dissolves in water will separate and curdle within minutes? Or is is something specifically to do with sugar? Specifically, what was it about the sugar that I added that caused the milk to curdle (the amount? something else?), and what is the nature of the curdling process? (The second question has been answered elsewhere, but it may be relevant in answering the first, which has not been asked elsewhere). Thank you for any advice. I know that next time, when I follow a recipe and want to get it absolutely right, I'll have a better understanding of what's going on, thanks to your answers. P.S. In the end I strained the mixtures, reserving the very sweet solids, and continued to reduce the sugar/milk liquid mixture until I ended up with something very similar in taste, colour and consistency to condensed milk.

It's not the sugar that caused the milk to curdle, it's the milk itself. Dulce de leche and caramel are both usually made with either cream, condensed, or evaporated milk. The issue with regular milk (especially skim), is that it has such a high water content and low fat content. The fat in cream buffers the protein, helping to prevent curdling, and the canned milks have already had most of the water removed, making them less likely to curdle. The sugar could also have a buffering effect on the milk protein, unfortunately you have a catch 22. In order to buffer the milk form curdling, the sugar would have to be dissolved in the milk. In order to dissolve sugar in the milk at a 1:1 ratio, the milk would have to be heated past the point where it would curdle. You might be able to prevent this by using a double boiler until the milk has reduced a lot. Making a caramel requires almost all of the water to be cooked out of your syrup, so this will take a really long time and isn't advisable.

My favorite balsamic salad dressing seems to have been discontinued, so I decided to make my own. In doing so I added far, far too much xanthan gum and am now left with 350ml of oily herbed balsamic gel. I tried adding oil to thin it out, but of course had no luck. I have not yet tried an immersion blender (it's too late at night here to run it). How can I recover from this, either moving ahead with the salad dressing or finding an alternate use for the gel, or should I just cut my losses and start over?

Well, adding more of everything but xanthan gum would of course have the effect of diluting the xanthan gum. The problem is, it's possible that you used way, way too much xanthan gum (easy to do, the amount you need to slightly thicken a dressing is minuscule), so unless you've got a few 50-gallon drums of balsamic vinegar lying around, I wouldn't advise that you go that route. Instead, I'd suggest that you make a new dressing with no xanthan gum, then add the old dressing a bit at a time until you like the result. As for finding an alternate use for (the rest of) your balsamic xanthan slime: I wouldn't. Xanthan gum is texturally quite unpleasant except at very low concentrations.

I made pavlovas last week from 4 egg whites and about a cup of sugar whipped together to a SUPER form meringue. I piped them on to a tray and baked first on 120 degrees for an hour and then on 70 degrees for another hour. Somewhere in the middle of baking the pavlovas turned brown. They were stil tasty, but how can I keep them white, like I see in restaurants?

First, double check that your oven temps are accurate with a thermometer that you can place in the oven. After that, two things I would try.. Rack Positioning I've baked meringues at similar temps without browning. It could be the position of the rack within the oven? If it was mainly the top that browned, move lower. If it was mainly the bottom that browned, move higher. Turn Off the Oven The other thing you could try is turning the oven off for the second stage of baking. I've baked meringues at 200 degrees F for an hour before, then I turn off the oven, prop the door open for about 5 minutes to cool, then close the door for a few hours. Hope one of these give you the results you're looking for.

What is the exact meaning of the phrase 'sift together'? If I need to 'sift together' flour, baking power, baking soda, and salt, does that mean put each one into the sifter sequentially, operating the sifter until is is empty before adding the next one? Or maybe I'm supposed to dump all these things into the sifter at once and then sift until it's empty? Perhaps I should dump all the ingredients into a bowl, mix them with a spoon, then sift the resulting mixture? Bonus points if you can tell me if I still need to stir ingredients which I have 'sifted together' in order to mix them. Thank you!

Or maybe I'm supposed to dump all these things into the sifter at once and then sift until it's empty? Bingo. Bonus points if you can tell me if I still need to stir ingredients which I have 'sifted together' in order to mix them. Nope. The sifting process and subsequent stirring in of other ingredients should do the job just fine.

I made a batch of peach salsa last night but forgot the vinegar. Can I add the vinegar and recan the peach salsa. It has the sugar, just forgot the vinegar

The key here is really how long it sits out at room temperature before you realize. The vinegar is acidic, so presumably it's part of bringing the pH to a safe one for boiling water canning. Without it, the salsa won't be safe to can like this. If you realize right away and recan immediately, it's basically just cooking it extra. It may not be as good with the extra cooking, but it'll be safe. Similarly, if you immediately refrigerate then reheat, it spends a bit longer in the danger zone, but it should be easily within a safe margin. On the other hand, if it sits out for hours, all bets are off. You made something not safe to store at room temperature, then stored it at room temperature, so you really can't know it's still safe.

I tried making alioli at home, but in the first step (turning the garlic into a fine paste), I didn't make much progress. I chopped the garlic fairly finely first, but when I tried crushing them with a wooden spoon in a wide low mug, the little pieces just ping off. What's the trick? Is there some way of softening them up first? Note that I'm not making it in commercial quantities, so the amount of garlic I'm using would scarcely reach up to the blade on my immersion blender.

I make garlic paste quite often, using this technique I saw on Bobby Flay. Put the whole clove on the board. Lay knife flat, and smack it with your hand. Remove paper and root. Dice finely. Sprinkle with the quantity of salt your recipe calls for. With the knife relatively flat, grind the garlic into the salt with the knife. Typically, I'll make a pass in one direction with the edge on the board, leading with the spine, and then come back with the spine on the board, leading with the edge. You need a wide knife (at least a french chef's knife, cleaver or santuko) in order to keep your fingers out of danger. I apply the downward pressure with the top of my palm, with my fingers curled back. Check this for a similar technique - http://www.howdini.com/howdini-video-6688064.html (The mincing starts around 2:40 After 5 or 6 passes, you should have a nice fine paste.

I liked to cut up a bunch of onions and bellpeppers once a week so that when I make eggs in the morning I just need to put a scoop in the pan and add the eggs once they are cooked. This has been going well, but I want some more variety by adding sausage and potatoes to the mix as well. For the sausage I plan to precook it and mix it in with the veggies. However, I'm not sure what to do for the potatoes as they take longer to cook. Should I simply chop and microwave them and add them? Or would I need to fry them a bit in the pan first so they will cook a bit in advanced?

When I've done this sort of thing, as I like to have my potatoes with some crunchy brown exterior, I would do the following: Bake a bunch of potatoes. Wrap them individually in aluminum foil, and stash them in the fridge. On the morning of: Start heating the pan, with some oil in it. Cut the potato into slabs Place the potatoes in the pan, and season the top. Go take a shower. (I started the water before I came to the kitchen) Flip the potatoes, add the other vegetables, and some more seasoning Go get dressed Come back, flip the vegetables over (I left the onions in slabs of rings) Go and shave. Use my spatula to cut everything into bite-sized pieces. Crack eggs into pan, scramble & season Finish cooking the eggs & plate. In your case, I don't know if I would mix the sausage in with the vegetables, as from the sounds of things the vegetables will still be raw. You would have issues with trying to make sure that everything is cooked through to the degree you want ... whereas keeping them separate means you can add one a minute or two before the other.

Please provide a list of alternative ingredients to baking powder, and how much of the substitute to use in place of baking powder.

I must confess, I can't give you straight substitution amounts -- all of these leavening agents behave somewhat differently, so in most cases a straight substitution for baking soda isn't appropriate. Ye Olde List of Leavening Agents: Biological Cultures (Wikipedia, plus kefir whey I've seen recipes for) Yeast - norm is 1 tsp/pound flour for 1-2 hour rise time Sourdough - uses 1/2 to 1/4 of final flour mass, rise time varies Kefir whey - similar to sourdough, unknown rise time or measurement Buttermilk - no clue what substitution ratio, but wikipedia lists it. Probably acts similar to kefir whey and sourdough. Yogurt -- wikipedia lists this as a leavening agent too, but I'm skeptical. Beer (unpasteurized, with live yeasts) Ginger beer (same deal) All of these share the common ability to ferment flour, when handled properly. Chemical Leaveners (Pulled straight from On Food and Cooking) Pearlash and potash (mostly potassium carbonate). Purely historical leaveners, these were derived from wood ashes, and were the predecessors to baking soda. Hartshorn AKA baker's ammonia (mix of ammonium carbamate and ammonium carbonate). Not used much anymore. It was once made from deer antlers, ergo the name. When heated, this produces both ammonia and carbon dioxide. Because of the ammonia, this cannot be used as a straight substitute for baking powder, due to the changes in flavor and smell it causes. Sodium bicarbonate (baking soda), basic component of baking powder, reacts immediately with acid Cream of tartar (tartaric acid) -- Acidic component, reacts with bases immediately Monocalcium phosphate -- Acidic component, common in baking soda, reacts immediately Sodium acid pyrophosphate -- Acidic component, reacts slowly with base after mixing Sodium aluminum sulfate -- Acidic component, provides the "double" in most double-acting baking powders. Reacts slowly under heat. Sodium aluminum phosphate -- Acidic component of double-acting baking powder, acts during early cooking at 100-104F/38-40C Dimagnesium phosphate -- Acidic component of double-acting baking powder, reacts early in baking @ 104-111F/40-44C Dicalcium phosphate dihydrate -- Acidic component of double-acting baking powder, reacts late in baking @ 135-140F/57-60C So, basically you need an acid + baking soda, or one of the heat-activated compounds (hartshorn, or one of the last four salts). In many cases a dough can provide its own lactic acid.

The attached picture is of a cookie recipe from my grandmother who passed a year ago. I would like to make the cookies, especially since they share my daughter's name, but there is one ingredient that I can't decode. It appears that the recipe calls for: Nora's Cookies: 2 cups sugar 2 eggs 1 cup ???? 1/2 cup milk 2 tsp cream of tartar 1 tsp soda salt vanilla and lemon extract flour to roll out What might the 3rd ingredient be?

It's "spry"... which is actually what it looks like. Spry was apparently a brand name shortening. This related question "Is there anything special about "homogenized" shortening?" recommends simply using any type of vegetable shortening, like Crisco.

Returning home after using cast iron cookware on a camping trip, I forgot to clean the cast iron in the midst of much unpacking and other matters. As a result of A) leaving any cookware with food in it for almost a week, and B) leaving a cast iron pot sealed with its cover on it, there was more mold in that cast iron pot than I'd ever seen on any cookware before. My main priority was to clean all the mold ASAP. I put the pot and pan (lid) outside in my yard, poured bleach on it, then followed up with boiling water. That seemed to kill all the mold, and nearby grass. After that, and rainy weather the following day when I intended to leave it outside to air out and dry in the sun, the cast iron became very rusted. Now I embark on the task of scraping off all the rust using steel wool, scrubbing the cookware with soap, rinsing it in hot water, drying it, then reseasoning it. This all has me wondering: when cast iron cookware gets very moldy, what's the most efficient and accessible way to make it hygienic and usable again?

The most efficient method would be to skip the whole bleach step, and start right in on burning the mold (and seasoning) off either in a fire or in an oven on the self-clean cycle. Then proceed to re-seasoning. Taking the bleach side trip adds the joy of rust removal, which you can avoid if you don't let the cleaned (by fire/heat) cast iron get damp before oiling it and starting the re-seasoning process.

I know it melts faster, but tearing cheese into rough parts and adding it to a white sauce melts just fine. Is there a specific reason to why you should shred cheese before adding it to a sauce?

You're right that the smaller pieces of cheese will melt faster than a whole block when added to a sauce. The main advantage to shredding or grating cheese is that you create smaller pieces of uniform size, and often smaller than can be achieved just by crumbling (at least when working with harder cheeses). The smaller the pieces the faster they melt, and if they're a consistent size/shape you don't have to investigate the sauce closely to find when the last, largest bit of cheese has been incorporated. This helps ensure the cheese will be evenly distributed throughout the sauce.

When you put a steamer in a pot of boiling water and put vegetables inside the steamer, how do you get them out after they are done? What tool do you use?

If you have a big colander, you can just put it over the top of the pot and turn it over, dumping the vegetables and the steamer in. The steamer is a lot easier to grab when it's not inside a pot full of steam, and you get it all done at once, no fishing around for the last couple pieces.

when combining hot sauces with different Scoville Heat Units (SHU), how do I estimate the resulting SHU? Say I combined 100 grams of a sauce that was 1,000 SHU with 100 grams of a sauce that was 2,000 SHU. Would the resulting SHU be the average: 1,500? I'm trying to make a super hot sauce (perhaps around 400,000 SHU) using something like Frank's as the base and adding some (a drop?!?) of those sauces that's like in the millions of SHU. I need help with the math.

You cannot calculate it, you can only measure it. Scoville is a subjective scale. Wikipedia tells you how it is measured - by testing with human panelists, using a certain protocol. As all subjective scales, Scoville is ordinal. Even though it is expressed in numbers, these numbers are best understood as ranks - you cannot assert that "1000 SHU is twice as hot as 500 SHU", for example, or that "the hotness difference between 500 SHU and 1000 SHU is the same as between 1000 SHU and 1500 SHU". If you take statistics, you will find that many methods are treating ordinal scales as if they were interval, and go on calculating averages and whatnot. This tends to work well enough for some applications. But in your case, you are dealing with human sensory perception. I am not 100% sure for the specific case of hotness, but typical human responses to a stimulus are logarithmic, not linear. So if you try to simplify your life and make a linearity assumption for Scoville, your estimates are likely to be so far off as to be unusable. If you really need an exact Scoville number for your sauce, it is not math you need, but the resources to conduct proper testing in several iterations. I fail to see the relevance of such goals for the home cook though. You eat sauce, not numbers.

How do I know whether I should use flat-leaf or curly-leaf parsley? I'm interested mostly in their uses as ingredients, but guidance on usage as garnishes is also welcome.

Flat-leaf (also called Italian Parsley) and curly parsley can be used interchangeably but most chefs prefer flat leaf as it usually has a more distinct taste. That is going to be up to you and your preference. Curly parsley provides a more unique and visually interesting look when you're talking about garnishes but putting a sprig of parsley on a plate is what would be called a "non-functional" garnish. Aside from adding a bit of green it serves no purpose as very few people I know will pop it in their mouth and eat it. You're better to sprinkle with chopped parsley or herbs that can help enhance/accent the flavor. Curly parsley is also visually appealing used in a parsley salad due again to the ruffled edges. I usually use flat-leaf if available, then curly if flat-leaf isn't available. Under no circumstances (except if you just need a touch of green dust) do I recommend using dried parsley. Clippings from the underside of yor lawn-mower probably have more flavor. Same goes for dried chives.

I was wondering if I could get some advice as I have intolerances to yeast and have heard of a few substitutions from: baking soda, baking powder, lemon juice, milk and yogurt. The question comes to how do I measure these into bread or baking to make whatever I am making rise? I have heard that in the middle east they rarely use yeast for bread baking and their bread still rises. I just don't know the proper measurements I would use, if a bread recipe calls for 1 or 2 packets of yeast and mixing them in water do you mix one tsp of baking soda and 1 tsp of lemon juice in together? If you can give me any advice on this that would be greatly appreciated, thanks.

There are no substitutes for yeast. What you list are not substitutes, but alternative leaveners: either actual baking powder, or a combination of baking soda and lemon juice or yogurt. The milk does not contribute to leavening at all. There is nothing you can do to mimic ordinary yeast or sourdough (which consists mostly of wild yeasts). If you were to use a chemical leavener in a bread recipe, everything would be wrong - the ingredients, the proportions, but most of all, the process. It will fail miserably. There are two classes of baked goods which are used as bread and don't contain yeast, quickbreads and unleavened breads. Quickbreads are made with chemical leaveners. Nowadays, practically nobody bakes them for use as a bread, but rather as a kind of less elegant cake. So the recipes common today are for the sweet and fruity varieties like banana bread. But if you can find a source of WWII era recipes, you'll probably find plain quickbreads without sugar, intended to be used instead of yeast breads. Unleavened breads don't rise, they are a class which contains things like flour tortillas and naan. They are indeed popular in the Middle East, but it is not true that "their bread still rises" - it doesn't, and it isn't intended to. You can get some amount of puffiness if you have a very hot oven, but this is impossible with electric appliances on 360 volts or below, it is done in wood ovens. And the pita still stays mostly flat, it is just somewhat airier, but it cannot be shaped as a loaf and still bake. I am sorry to hear about your condition, but all you can do is to search for recipes for quickbreads and flatbreads. Yeast cannot be substituted. There is a bit of explanation on leavening mechanisms in this question: Why are there no recipes combining both yeast and baking powder?.

Is fresh ginger a good substitute for galangal in a Thai Green curry? (I cannot get fresh galangal here anywhere) Would I use less or more ginger than galangal quantity?

Scottish, Use equal amounts of ginger to substitute for galangal. And yes, it is the best substitute available from your average non-Asian grocery store. If you can get your hands on dried, powdered galangal, however, you can do better. Add about half the amount of ginger, and around midway through cooking add a teaspoon of powdered galangal for every tablespoon of fresh in the recipe. The combination of fresh ginger and powdered galangal will be very close to fresh galangal in flavor. Also, if you make a field trip to an Asian market, peeled galangal cut into chunks freezes quite well.

I know it sounds like an obvious question. At work, my colleague has a drip-filter machine he uses to brew his tea. He puts about two table spoons for an eight cup pot. This makes nice strong tea. I use a glass infuser teapot, which I put two teaspoons in for about a mug of tea. This has the advantage of being easy to clean up, and convienient. However, it's not nearly as strong as the drip tea. How can I make my tea stronger? Do I simply need to put more tea in? Nb. I'm talking about for black tea. For green tea, I'm putting in 1.5 teaspoons, and adding a little cold water first, and that comes out fine.

You cannot make it stronger with this style of pot. You are limited by Nernst's law: the amount of solute extracted from the leaf into the tea does not depend only on the amount of tea leaves, but also on the current concentration of solute in the liquid surrounding the leaves. If you make tea using loose leaves in a teapot, they float everywhere, with sufficient distance between leaves. Several processes in the teapot (convection, diffusion, etc.) let the solutes move around easier, and you get an even, weak, concentration throughout the teapot, so the layer of tea surrounding each leaf has low concentration and works against the leaf from all sides, extracting lots of stuff. If you make it using a drip style method, the leaves are packed together, but the water moving through them doing the extracting is fresh and has no solute in it at all, so it is able to extract a lot. But with your style of teapot, the water is of course able to get into the infuser through the tiny slits, but once this has happened, there is very little exchange between the infuser and the rest of the teapot. The slits create a bottleneck, and you end up with an area of highly concentrated tea in the infuser and an area of low concentrated tea outside, with little communication between the two. The concentrated tea in the infuser can't extract the tea well. You could always increase the amount of tea or the time you infuse, but both methods have their drawbacks. Bottom line: you have to decide between well extracted tea or conveniently extracted tea. The same methods which make teapots easy to clean (concentrating the tea leaves in a small area without too much communication with the rest of the pot) reduce the extraction quality and strength.

Some of ghee I find in stores has liquid on top (with some solids floating about), while in other brands it is completely solid (both jars are stored at the same temperature). Also, the latter ghee (that doesn't split into a liquid layer on top) is often twice as expensive as the former. So, what is the "right" texture/consistency for ghee? Are the more "solid" brands just better at filtering out the usual water and protein? Or, are there really some components of butterfat itself that melt at lower temperatures, only to get filtered out by the more "solid" ghee brands?

Ghee is suppose to be 100% butter fat. The water has since been boiled off. If it has a liquid portion at room temperature this is either they did not remove all the water and solids that floated to the surface or an additive liquid or preservative did not set right (Most likely). I would avoid it if possible. If not, use your nose and make sure it is not gone rancid.

I am in the last leg of a kitchen remodel and need to purchase a garbage disposal. And I am wondering how much of a difference horse power makes in the day to day operation of the kitchen? Has anyone here experienced the pros and cons to disposal units with different horse power? NOTE: I almost posted this question on the DIY site, but I feel it has more relevance here. Moderators, feel free to move it if you think it belongs there instead. UPDATE: We decided to go with the Waste King L-8000 Legend Series 1 Horsepower. It is really smooth and quiet. It takes up a fair amount of space under the sink however.

I'd go for a more powerful one, in general, and I noticed that the higher powered disposals are sometimes quieter, which I really like. I really learned that paying the extra for good plumbing parts (faucet, disposal) through our plumber was worth it, since they can be fixed, unlike cheaper big box store stuff, and that there was a real difference in the higher quality disposal.

I am baking Swedish Limpa Bread. The recipe calls for mixing rye flour with a molasses/ anise seed, salt and water mixture and letting rise overnight or nine to ten hours. Does this exhaust the sourdough starter, leading to little rise in the bread? How can I rectify this problem?

Generally when you have issues regarding oven spring at home, the problem is heat and steam in your oven rather than yeast activity. In commercial bakeries, sourdoughs are frequently fermented for overnight or longer, so that shouldn't be a problem. A lot of the expansion you see in the oven is from the moisture in your dough converting to steam before the crust has set. In a bakery, we can achieve this by using steam injected ovens which allow the crust to remain elastic longer. Bakeries also use hearth and convection ovens which transfer heat into the loaf more efficiently causing it to create steam faster. To recreate this at home, you can try moistening the crust of your bread before baking it or trying to create steam in your oven. You can encourage steam by starting your oven at a higher temperature and turning it down after a few minutes, or by baking on a pizza stone to simulate a hearth. It's important to get the steam down first though, as the heat transfer without steam will cause a lot of crust cracking and weird rising. It's also important to note that if your dough has a high proportion of rye flour, rye traps bubbles via gums called pentosans rather than via a gluten network like wheat dough. It generally won't rise in the same way that wheat doughs will.

I have just visited China (Beijing). There I had Peking Duck which was wonderful. They served it with a sauce - sort of sweet, brown and thick. I was wondering if anyone has a name for this sauce as the people I was with did not know the name. I really loved this sauce and want to use it with other things - any help on its name would be great!

Traditionally, the sauce combines several ingredients, one of which, as Bart mentioned, is Hoisin sauce. The other ingredients are: Sesame Oil Hoisin sauce Dark sugar or honey Water Dark soy sauce. Cornstarch You can usually buy this at your local Chinese supermarket, but it's easier and more tasty to make your own.

I've been on a quest for a while now to make my own root beer. I've tried all sorts of recipes using all sorts of ingredients, and I now have this huge collection of spices and roots and leaves... but no root beer to show for it. It always comes out bitter and kind of gross. I tried to get down to basics. From what I've read, sassafrass is the key ingredient, so I thought I'd make a tea out of just that and see how that goes. (Yes, I know there are claims that sassafrass has a cancer causing agent, and that it's not used anymore, and people use wintergreen or sarsaparilla instead. But, health concerns aside, everything I've read seems to have a consensus that sassafrass is the original flavour for root beer.) When I open my bag of sassafrass root bark, it has a smell lightly evocative of root beer, but also kind of earthy (I'm bad at describing smells). Most recipes I've seen call for steeping the sassafrass for about 20 to 25 minutes, with a ratio of about one tablespoon of sassafrass for each cup of water. Starting with that basis, I've tried various combinations of adjusting times and ratios, and also two different brands of sassafrass, but the fundamental problem remains. It's always bitter. Too bitter to cover up with any amount sweetener or other ingredients. Sweetener and other ingredients (cinnamon, vanilla, star anise, allspice...) don't cover bitterness, they just exist alongside it. When I look on Amazon at reviews by people who have bought the same sassafrass root bark that I did, there are all these statements saying "we made root beer and it was great!" or "brought back childhood memories of home made root beer!" and that sort of thing, accompanied by five stars. But all I have is a brown liquid that is on one level a pale imitation of root beer, and on another level has a bitterness that won't go away. Where am I going wrong?

Sassafras tea will naturally taste a little bitter. When I was younger, a friend of mine used to bring us some sassafras root in order for us to make this tea. He always recommended never to make it too strong because of the affects of the bitterness on the stomach. Try using smaller doses of sassafras in your tea. It should be more on the pale shade of color rather than too dark. Here is how to make sassafras tea. It is true that the original root beer was derived from the sassafras root, however the modern root beer does not contain any sassafras in it confection.

I have several cupcake recipes. I know it's easy to convert to a cake (just adjust baking time and figure out correct pan size). My question is many of the cupcake recipes have a filling that is (for the most part) just sort of stabbed into the baked cupcake using a squeeze bottle. These fillings are usually between artificial maple syrup and pudding in consistency/thickness. If I want to use the filling, how would I incorporate it into the cake other than repeatedly "stabbing" the cake in various places? A google search only tells me to tort the cake, but I'd like to leave it in a single layer if possible (plus I don't think the cupcake fillings would hold up to be filling layer in a layered cake).

A syringe (or baster, but a syringe will be better) A LOT of holes, and frosting to hide the holes (though they will be pretty small if you use a syringe.) Given the comment that "I don't want it to be like several filled donuts joined together where it's not consistent" in combination with a refusal to consider layering it, you need a dense pattern of holes and a measured amount of filling in each hole. So, for a 9x13 pan, you might be looking at 8x12 = 96 holes an inch apart, starting 1/2 inch from the edge, each filled with 1/96th of your total amount of filling. Adjust as needed for other size cakes and how well an inch apart suits your idea of "consistent" - you could go to 17x25 holes 1/2 inch apart and 1/4 inch from the edge, but it's going to be rather tedious. Or you could TRY a more cake-centric approach - half the batter, the filling, half the batter, bake. It might fail miserably, it might "work" for some value of "work," it might require changing the filling to get a better value of "work." Certainly marble cakes and pudding cakes do things of this nature at the batter stage before baking.

I've seen many jelly and jam recipes. Some with and without gelatin, generally all with sugar and in varying amounts. However, I am wondering what is most important for the preserving the food. I know that gelatin helps preserve the jam/jelly by cutting the flow of air. However, is there something else in gelatin that is doing the work? If not can it be substituted by Irish Moss or Agar? Sugar seems to have a gelatinizing effect also (less than actual gelatin though). Is it the gelatinizing effect that is helping to preserve the food, or is something else happening chemically? Cooking is also used for food preservation, but it seems you can also have raw preserves. Just asking the question has me asking many more. I also realize there are many books on the subject, but I guess this is my first step in a deeper understanding of the subject.

Jams and jellies most commonly use pectin, not gelatin. But in either case, the purpose is to make it set, i.e. gel up. It's just about texture, not preservation. Without that you'd have a thick liquid, not really much good for spreading on things. The main ingredient that contributes to safety of canned jam and jelly are is acid: the natural acidity of the fruit you're canning, plus possibly added citric acid or lemon juice. They create an inhospitable environment for whatever survives the canning process. The sugar content does help too, but the pH is the primary concern. The canning process is also critical. Primarily, it creates a vacuum seal on the jar so that no recontamination happens. Without that, pretty much anything would eventually grow mold. Additionally, pressure canning allows the contents to reach an even higher temperature, killing even more bacteria, allowing for canning of foods without high acid and sugar level like vegetables. All of this is pretty hard to verify on your own, and the consequences of improperly canned food can be pretty bad (severe food poisoning, possible death), hence the usual recommendation to only use recipes from trusted sources. If on the other hand you're talking about small batches of jam or jelly that you just keep in the refrigerator without ever canning them, you don't exactly have preserved food. It'll last a while, much longer than raw fruit, but there's a good chance it'll eventually mold. It's still the acid and sugar that make the difference, though. I'm don't think air flow is really an issue here as you suggest. If you didn't use gelatin or pectin, that thick liquid would still only have air contact on the surface, which is already pretty much the best possible scenario.

Items placed in my freezer take on an awful flavor that tastes a lot like freezer burn, even ice cubes. If I put items in the freezer over-night and it isn't tightly covered, this problem occurs. With the ice cubes I can rinse them off to eliminate the bad flavor, but I'd prefer to find the root cause and fix it. Any ideas/suggestions are quite welcome.

Freezer burn occurs when water molecules in food gather in a colder location in your freezer—whether that be the sides of your freezer or even other foods. Tips to prevent freezer burn: Don't put hot food directly into your freezer, let it cool first Put your food in air-tight containers The longer food is in the freezer the greater your chance of freezer burn I'm going to go out on a limb though and guess that—at least with your ice cubes may just be acquiring a "freezer smell" from the other foods in your freezer. If I don't use the cubes in my freezer fast enough they end up tasting really unpleasant. Give your freezer a good cleaning and cover your ice cubes with saran wrap and this should help stop the funny smells/tastes.

I have it from two sources that asparagus should be peeled before being cooked in simmering water (Julia Child) or fried in butter (Heston Blumenthal). I tried Julia's method once and I've been discouraged from peeling them again ever since. I probably overcooked on that attempt; they turned out a bit limp. But even so, don't asparagus look nicer with the skin on? And what's wrong with the skin anyway? The asparagus spears I buy are quite thin with tender skin. Does the advice to peel only apply for thick asparagus spears?

As a rule of thumb that would pretty much coincide with what JustRightMenus said: green asparagus is generally not peeled, but white asparagus should definitely be peeled. I think it's the same plant, just cultivated in a different way. (And interestingly, in Germany and the Netherlands, the green stuff is much less common, whereas in North America I've never seen the white ones.)

Can they be frozen, before being cooked, for a week? I'm making sauerbrauten & potato balls for 25 people, and thought if I could make them a week earlier and just cook them that day, it would be a lot easier.

Yes, you can freeze them: I have done it before, and it works just fine. They key (in my experience, that is) is to freeze the balls quickly if uncooked, and put them into the boiling water still frozen when you actually do the cooking. I have also been freezing cooked potato balls, and that works just fine as well -> In that case, warm them up in hot, but not boiling, water. A note due to the comment below: The recipe I use calls for half cooked, and half raw potatoes, with the raw half being pressed almost totally try of water; and they DO fall apart if I do not take that part seriously. So, except for potato-flour added again, there is not that much raw potato starch left when I freeze them.

How can I package durian flesh so that its fragrance / smell cannot be detected? I tried to package some durian flesh using several layers of ziplocs followed by several layers of plastic bags but it didn't prevent the fragrance from escaping the package.

Maybe I am hurting unstated assumptions behind the question, but: you could try making canned durian. Smell means that volatile substances are being emitted from the fruit into the air, and land on your airways' mucosa. Canning jars for home use underpressurized air to seal. This means that they are not just sealed the way plastic bags are, there are no molecules travelling from the jar to the outside at all - if there was any hole for molecules to go through, they would go into the other direction, from the pressurized atmosphere to the underpressurized jar. So, no air exchange. And the glass is impermeable even for small molecules, unlike the plastic of sealing bags and the like, which may let some air through. The solution still has to be tested for real-life suitability. One concern is that the underpressure is achieved by having the hot jars release some of their contents into the canner - mostly air from the headspace, but small leaks are expected to happen from a few of the jars out of a batch. If the jars spend several minutes in a durian-scented water bath, it may be that they continue to reek for a long time after being taken out. So you would have to test - preferably with extra headspace. Also, since there seem to be no official recipes published on home canning durian, you'll need to measure your own pH and adjust if needed.

I put a partially frozen (inside) chicken in my convection oven, set it to what I thought was 400ºF (200ºC) and left the room with a timer on. An hour later it was discovered the temperature was only 150-200ºF (65-93ºC). It was in the convection oven an hour! I quickly set the correct temperature and finished cooking it. I just don't know if the hour it spent in the convection oven on the lower temperature did something with bacteria. I cooked it to an internal temperature of 180ºF (80ºC) degrees. Is it safe to eat this chicken?

Assuming you thawed the chicken (to the extent that you did) in the refrigerator, and further assuming that it took less than an hour to reach a safe internal temperature, I would say you are fine. An internal temperature of 180ºF (80ºC) is safe by quite a margin. The USDA recommends that home cooks do not keep food within the "Danger Zone" of 40-140ºF (4-60ºC) for more than 2 hours. This includes preparation and cooking time. If you thawed the bird on the kitchen counter, or if your chicken accompanied you on a long journey from the supermarket in an unfrozen state, you'll have to factor that time in. As @Jefromi's comment on another answer notes, simply reaching a high enough internal temperature is not a guarantee of safety since some microbes produce toxins that are heat-stable.

I know its wired but i need to keep my pizza for one hour in oven with 230 Celsius degrees to properly cook it but everyone says 20 minutes or less is enough i don't know why it takes so long for me sorry for bad English its not my native language

One hour sounds like a long time for a 1.5 to 2 cm thick pizza at that temperature, regardless of the style of pizza. I would begin by locating an oven thermometer to check the temperature of your oven.

I'm cooking beef ribs and I am trying to cook oriental ribs and I want to cut the cooking time in half.

Does your rice cooker have a scale up the inside of the bowl? With mine, you add a number of scoops of rice, then fill with water up to the correct number on the side of the bowl. Maybe it is just that the manual is badly worded, and this isn't clear? It's a long shot, I know, but just thought I'd mention it in case you hadn't noticed :)

This is a rødskjell sushi in Norwegian (where I point with the sticks) and translated as redshell sushi in English. I am trying to find what it is. They have used some green to roll it around, it is probably some sea thing. Is it a fish or is it something else?

According to a few sushi websites, red shell sushi is known as arc shell, akaki or akagai sushi. It is a type of clam that gets its red color from lots of hemoglobin in its flesh. One source Another source And the green stuff is definitely nori.

I have made both the classic and the speedy version of the no-knead bread recipe provided by Mark Bittman in the New York Times. The one change I make is that I use active dry yeast rather than instant, simply because I don't typically have the latter at hand. I measure out the amount of water the recipe calls for, take out a quarter cup or so, heat it for a few seconds in the microwave so that it is warm (but not hot), dissolve the yeast in the warmed water, then add the dissolved yeast and the rest of the water to the flour to make the dough. In the video that accompanies the speedy bread recipe, Jim Lahey suggests using hot water and adding a couple drops of red wine vinegar. The last couple of times I tried the recipe, I tried those suggestions. I separated out the water for dissolving the yeast and heated the rest beyond merely warming as needed for the yeast. I warmed the water for the yeast as usual. I added the hot water and a couple drops vinegar to the flour and gave it a couple of stirs first before adding the yeast water, as I thought the yeast would die if it came in contact with the hot water. Both times, the bread was disastrous. The dough simply failed to rise sufficiently. Instead of more than doubling in size in four hours, it looked as though it had gotten to perhaps 1.5 times the original size, and it was quite smooth, like kneaded dough, instead of bubbly and stringy as the no-knead dough is supposed to be. The first time, I thought I had made a mistake and added too little yeast, so I didn't think too much about it. The second time, though, I know I measured out the right amount of yeast and I was pretty careful in following the procedure. So I'm trying to account for the lack of rising. A little research suggested that perhaps the vinegar didn't help the yeast to rise, as it ordinarily would, but overwhelmed and killed the yeast. I used a stainless steel bowl for mixing dough and letting it rise. I know that using stainless steel is generally fine, but perhaps it's a bad idea to add vinegar to the dough if I'm using stainless steel? Would this account for the lack of rise in the dough? What other reasons might there be for the failure of the dough to rise? I tested my yeast with sugar dissolved in water and it's fine. Thanks!

First and foremost, the classic recipes states quite clearly, "Dough is ready when its surface is dotted with bubbles." Expecting microorganisms to do their work in precisely the same amount of time, every time, requires a good bit of precision on your part. Why the slow rise? Almost definitely a yeast problem. The question is, which kind of yeast problem? Acid can kill yeast, heat can kill yeast, salt can kill yeast, sitting in a package forever can kill them, and there are other, less likely scenarios too. Are you using jarred active dry yeast or individual packets? You mention testing it, but what technique did you use, a little water and sugar, watch for bubbles? You can (and probably should) do this at the beginning of the recipe, so that your yeast is kickstarted into alertness. Stainless steel is not the problem. It's non-reactive. Vinegar is likely to slow the growth, so you probably just need to give it more time. The best way to judge readiness is by the dough, not by the clock. Another factor is that a few degrees difference can make a difference in the rate of yeast growth and CO2 production: "With glucose as growth-limiting substrate in the chemostat and aerobic conditions in the respirometer, the carbon dioxide output was found to be higher as temperature at which the organisms were cultured increased from 25 to 39" --Journal of Microbiosology Hope these help, but I think there's not just one answer here.

My organic eggs have a date of June 24 on them; today is June 28. Can I still cook them? (I am not used to purchasing organic eggs.)

Check again, the date should be 'sell by' rather than 'eat by'. If you're in the US, you should have at least a couple weeks to eat them after the sell by date.

What is the best coffee solution for a small office (about 10 people)? We are looking for something that is: Tasty Fast Easy We have fairly discriminating taste, although it doesn't have to be barista quality. Any recommendations on what might be a good combination of machine, grounds, process, etc. would be much appreciated.

a Keurig or other single-cup coffee maker might be a good idea, everyone could have their own favorites. The coffee isn't amazing but it's surprisingly decent.

Recipes for beef stew generally call for salting and peppering the meat before browning, then simmering for a long time. How is that different from browning, then adding the same quantity of salt and pepper to the liquid, either at the start of simmering or at the end?

There doesn't seem to be much of a difference in nutrition between pressure cooking and boiling beans. Cooking at pressure cooker temperatures at 10, 20, or 40 minutes instead of boiling in a pot changed the nutrition/antinutrient content and digestibility by less than 5%. Soaking prior to cooking was generally found to be advantageous. However, the results were not unanimous, and it didn't change very much in terms of nutrition. Soaking and discarding the water was found to: reduce the carbohydrate fraction and maintain/increase fiber content. reduce mineral content, but increase bioavailability. reduce the oligosaccarides that cause flatulence. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0308814604004649 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1365-2621.2010.02395.x

Why is alcohol used to prepare extracts, such as mint extract?

Simple. The compounds that give mint its minty flavor are alcohol soluble, so with alcohol present you can "extract" them. There are other things use can use, propylene glycol is one. Basically you need a solvent that can also serve as a carrier for the flavor you want. Water doesn't work, most flavors are not water soluble. Many are oil soluble, but using oil gives you a different product entirely, as does using vinegar for the acid, which is also a solvent. If your final product is high in alcohol, propylene glycol or acid, it will also be well protected against quick spoilage.

Occasionally, I see a product in the supermarket that is either sold off the shelf at room temperature (then expected to be refrigerated after opening), or right out of the fridge. I use soy milk as an example, but there are other products that fit the bill as well (though the only other one that comes to mind is almond milk). What's (most likely to be) the difference between a product sold refrigerated and its equivalent sold room-temperature?

The canning process makes food safe: existing bacteria and fungi are killed, the intrusion of new pathogens is prevented by sealing the container. (More e.g. here.) As soon as you open the can or jar, its contents are exposed to the surrounding air which will contain bacteria and fungal spores. Some of those will happily grow feeding on the food they land on. Refrigerating slows down their metabolism, meaning they can't reach dangerous numbers within the recommended storage time after opening. For more info on storing food, see our canonical posts on food storage and on how long quickly-spoiling food can be left at room temperature.

I'd like to buy myself the best roasting pan and I'm stuck on whether to get an Enameled Cast Iron or a thicker Stainless Steel/tri-ply type pan. I'm looking for the pro/cons of each, and any personal experience with either variety. So far I know that: CI is heavy CI will heat more evenly, but will take longer to heat up I can gently use metal tools on either Both are induction-ready! I have electric coil-type heating elements, so either should be fine for the stovetop. As far as what I'll be cooking in it, it will probably be a bit of everything. Meat, veggies, potatoes, onions, lasagna, you name it. Is either one better at creating a fond, making gravy, or cooking down veggies/onions? Or are those just a matter of paying attention while cooking? :)

The enamel is brittle, especially when scratched. cast iron is often cheaper. They clean differently: stainless is initially a little harder to clean, but polishes with use making cleaning easier. Food initially sticks less to enamel, but scratches and cracks change this. using steel wool to clean stainless improves the finish, using it to clean enamel scratches the finish. If you are gentle with enamel it should last decades,stainless will survive children beating on it with almost anything, and can be passed to your grandchildren. thinner metal will heat quicker and cool quicker, but will develop hot spots. Thicker metal will heat more evenly, but heats and cools slower.

I make a vegetable sandwich which I find very good. It has tomato, red onion, avocado, and cucumber. However, it lacks spiciness. I want to avoid spreads and use a vegetable for mild heat. I tried an anaheim pepper. It has some kick but the texture does not work. It slides out. With the cucumber I cut them the length of the sandwich so they have structure. Is there something with texture of cucumber but the spice of mild pepper?

For this specific requirement I eat sliced cherry peppers in my sandwiches. While they are not the length that you could cut cucumbers, I have little problem keeping them in the sandwich. I have about as much trouble keeping tomatoes in the sandwich, and I rarely have to replace them.

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 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.

Making jam usually requires pectin which is extracted from fruit. If the traditional purpose of making jam is to preserve fruit, why would it be a good idea to extract the pectin from one fruit to preserve another. This seems circular.

The "paradox" here is a result of an oversimplified explanation of reality. The crux is in the traditional purpose of making jam is to preserve fruit For the addition of pectin to make no sense, you have to make two assumptions: 1) that the only reason is to have access to fruit in winter (which is what I think you mean as "to preserve fruit"), and 2) that no matter what you do in your life, you have to always be efficient, as in not wasting resources and trying to get the highest amount of output you can. I would argue that both are untrue. The efficiency argument is highly prevalent in our current society, but it is not an absolute imperative. And the idea that people do things for a single purpose, and it is the same purpose for all people doing it, is simply untrue for most situations in life. There is not "the purpose" of making jam, there are many different purposes. Here is an incomplete list in no particular order: Having access to some form of fruit in winter Having a sweet bread spread Having all the ingredients for that pie recipe you absolutely love Being proud of something you made yourself Having a nice gift with a personal touch for people who can afford to buy what they need anyway Feeling connected to the traditions of your culture Learning something new Having more personal connection to your food Having an activity in which you can involve your whole family Doing something about these 17 kg of ripe cherries on your tree that are all ripe in the same week People make jam for some combination of these reasons, with different people giving different weight to each of them. Sure, if you are thinking of a medieval peasant in Western Europe who is dependent on subsistence farming, both your assumptions are likely to be true, and it would make little sense to add pectin to jam. But that farmer wouldn't have had access to powdered pectin anyway, nor to many of the kinds of fruit which need pectin for canning anyway. I'm pretty sure they must have made their jams mostly without added pectin. But modern food has developed under completely different conditions, and there is no barrier to pectin becoming part of jams.