Tired of seeing the bottoms of your copper pans looking all black and discolored? Here's how to clean them.
Tip of the Day: Use pickle juice to clean copper pans
Continue reading Tip of the Day: Use pickle juice to clean copper pans
Tip of the Day: How to thicken pasta sauce
Have you ever stood at your stove cooking pasta sauce and you realize it's too watery, and you don't have any tomato paste, flour, or corn starch? Here's how to thicken it.
I am a Boston creme donut
A couple weekends ago, while on a road trip, a friend mentioned she'd heard you could tell a person's personality by their donut choice. We all immediately began discussing our favorite donuts - classic glazed, chocolate frosted, buttermilk. I favor Dunkin' Donuts - chocolate glazed or coconut - despite having grown up half an hour away from a drive-through Krispy Kreme store where you could get hot , melt-in-your-mouth glazed donuts right off the conveyor belt. Not that those aren't good - I just like the greater heft of a Dunkin Donuts cake donut. You can eat two and actually feel full. Or eat, say, five and feel really, really full. So I Googled "donuts" and "personality" and came up with several quizzes and guides to donuts and human nature. The What Donuts Are You? quiz tells me I'm a Boston creme, tough on the outside but a gushy traditionalist within. Fry My Bacon's guide to donut personality tells me that my choice, coconut, makes me a mostly serene creature with a yearning for tropical places, yet prone to sudden fits of rage. Interesting. And woe on the double chocolate lovers - greedy, decadent, but never truly satisfied!
If you have enough popsicle sticks, why not build a boat?
Ok, are you a popsicle fiend? Do you eat those ice cream treats that come on a stick? The real question is, do you have tons of those sticks lying around the house and you just don't know what to do with them? Here is one thought: build a boat.While you're at it, make it a seaworthy replica of a Viking boat, and then sail it to England (or somewhere maybe a little closer if that's a bit far for you). Of course you must remember to reinforce it with fiberglass, first please. An American living in the Netherlands did just that when his wife kept complaining about all the popsicle sticks lying around. I must admit that this would not be my first thought of a solution.
The Viking ship took millions (15) of sticks and tons (2.2) of glue to make, not to mention many years (sorry, the story's not that specific). Even though I wouldn't have thought of this, I am glad that someone did. We all need a dream to reach for and something to smile about.
Tip of the Day: How to clean a burned pan
You blackened the bottom of your favorite pot. What to do?
One of the greatest April Fool's jokes ever: Swiss spaghetti harvest
It's April 1st and you know what that means: it's April Fool's Day! You'll probably be avoiding (or not) tricks all day. I bet nothing will top this one from the BBC. A well respected news program called Panorama broadcast a story in 1957 about a great spaghetti harvest in Switzerland. The public fell for it hook, line, and sinker. The BBC fielded hundreds of calls from viewers asking how they, too, could grow a spaghetti tree, to which they answered "Place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best."
This is the first I had heard of this, but it is classic! The footage from the original story is quite nice, but I can't imagine anyone actually believing it. Ah well, I guess I come from a much more cynical and media savvy age, but it's neat to look back on a time when a hoax like this was possible.
I found some very useful tea tips
I'm sure I've mentioned a few times that I love tea. I drink it almost every day, and I tend to go for that beverage even when I go to a "coffee" shop.While roaming the blogs today I came across a great list of tea tips over at the Accidental Hedonist. The list is fairly long, but not overly so. It is also pretty thorough. You get advice on several things, from switching to loose leaf tea to cleaning tea stains.
There are one or two tips I don't quite agree with, but over all these are some pretty good things for a tea drinker to know. Check out the whole list and see what you think. Do you have any good tea tips? I'd love to know about them.
How do you know when to throw those canned goods out?
When it comes to food, I think it's best to use fresh, unprocessed items. That said, sometimes it's hard to escape canned goods. And canned foods aren't necessarily bad. But how do you tell when they've stayed in your pantry for too long?The truth is, that can be a tough question to answer. Turns out there's not really an industry standard. There are a variety of dates that can be on a can each with its own meaning. I found an article on this over at Red Orbit that attempts to sort things out and give you some useful information.
If you've ever wondered what the "sell by" date means, you might want to check this out. It could help you decide what to keep if you have some canned foods that have been around for a bit.
Legal absinth market grows in US
In articles at the LA Times and NY Times they discuss the new, legal absinth's entering the US. Long banned due to faulty research that said that the chemical thujone, which is in the key ingredient, wormwood, was a hallucinogen and toxic. The reality is that the thujone levels in absinthe are extremely low and under the FDAs maximum guidelines. Those Bell Époque artists and writers weren't hallucinating from the thujone. They were just drinking themselves to that point from the alcohol. There are several absinthe's that have currently passed FDA approval.
I personally hadn't had any absinthe until this past year when I tasted a few. They are similar to a good herby pastis with a high alcohol content and not sweet. They are usually served in the absinthe ritual where absinthe is poured into a special glass, a perforated spoon laid on top holding a sugar cube, and ice water drizzled down over the sugar melting it and watering down the absinthe. The drink goes a cloudy green from oils suspended in the cold mixture. Here is a link to a video showing the ritual and here is the Virtual Absinthe Library so you can learn more than would ever want to know about it. I think I may have a go at developing my own absinthe when I open my distillery this spring.
Do you think Robert Irvine should keep his job?
Robert Irvine has gotten himself into a lot of trouble lately. In case you haven't been paying attention to the food blogs, the host of Food Network's "Dinner: Impossible" was caught either lying about or exaggerating his resume (depending on who you ask). He has gotten hos bio pulled from Food Network's website and has been fired from the show.Well, he must be pretty popular in some sectors, because there is a campaign going on to save hos job. A group called Save Robert Irvine has sprung up and they want you to help keep the chef as host of "Dinner: Impossible). The website suggests going to the Food Network.com's comments section and let them know how much you love Mr Irvine. You can help even more by signing the online petition.
If you think that Robert Irvine is the best host for "Dinner: Impossible" and what he did isn't that bad, then maybe you'd like to help. You can sign the petition today.
[Via Serious Eats]
St. Patrick's Day: Corned Beef or Smoked Pork Shoulder for dinner?
I got in a long phone conversation last night with a friend of mine, Chef Josh Gamage, about St. Patrick's Day. I asked about how it's celebrated here in Maine from a food and drink standpoint. Growing up in NY I am used to enormous partying, eating mediocre corned beef and cabbage, and drinking many pints of stout; while grooving to the madness of the Upper East Side and the Parade. No green beer for me, thanks. Then the next day I buy a half dozen corned beef when they go on sale and freeze them for later use.
Josh told me that here in Maine it isn't celebrated as much as I am used to, but at home there is usually a New England boiled dinner on March 17th. The question is, what meat is boiled for the dinner? It seems that according to Josh there is a 50/50 break on whether it will be boiled Corned Beef or boiled Smoked Pork Shoulder.
I immediately ran to my library and the internet to do some research. I found that boiled pork is much more likely to be an authentic Irish meal. Beef wasn't a traditional Irish food, but pork was and is. With bacon, basically any cut of pork or smoked pork the choice for St. Patrick's Day dinner. It seems that beef was exported to England but too expensive for the Irish, but pork was a plentiful food.
Continue reading St. Patrick's Day: Corned Beef or Smoked Pork Shoulder for dinner?
Tip of the Day: Help preserve the flavor in dried herbs
Though I try to use fresh herbs as much as possible, a good selection isn't always available so I started drying my own a few years ago. Doing this, I'm able to buy them in bulk when they are on sale or pick them fresh out of my garden in peak season. Admittedly, there is also the added bonus of not having to purchase as many of those tiny bottles of the ground variety which cost $5.00 each (or more!), for very little flavor.A friend of mine advised that I start placing the fresh herbs in paper bags with a sheet of paper towel to absorb extra moisture, allowing them to dry out in there. Apparently the darkness helps prevent light from changing or damaging the flavor, plus the bag itself keeps the herbs clean and clear of dust or other substances. This has dramatically helped to preserve the flavor of the herbs that I am drying, and when used in cooking, it is hard to tell they aren't fresh out of the garden.
Tip of the Day: Make your own brown sugar
I know we've all done it. You're right in the middle of making something and you realize that you don't have a necessary ingredient. Well if that ingredient is brown sugar, you may be in luck.If you happen to have granulated sugar and molasses, you can make brown sugar. I've never actually measured the amounts before, as I generally just add molasses until I like the results. But I think it'd be 1-2 tablespoons of molasses to a cup of sugar, if you feel you need measurements.
This can be a big help in a pinch. If you don't have any of these staples, well, I guess this wouldn't be much use to you. But you never know when a tip might come in handy.
That's a surprise: a diamond falls out of a cracker
Well here's something that doesn't happen every day. A British woman, Kim Stead, bit into a cracker (called biscuits in England), and a diamond fell out. Of course she was really excited about it at first, but quickly came to the conclusion that it probably wasn't worth that much.The diamond was pretty small and had probably fallen out of a jewelry setting. She did notify the cracker company, McVitie, who at first suggested that it might be crystallized sugar. Once Mrs. Stead assured them it was a diamond, McVitie sent a package for her to return to them so they could start an investigation.
No word on if Mrs. Stead has returned the diamond yet or any results. What would you do if you found something like that in your food?
Supe up your Kitchen Aid
This has got to be one of the coolest things I've seen in a long time. I just came across a link to a site that sells flame decals for Kitchen Aid mixers! The website, FlameKA.com, carries a wide variety of decals that will fit Kitchen Aid classic, the Artisan 4-6 quarts, and the Pro 600. They claim that the decals won't interfere with any attachments. They're also supposed to be easy to apply, long lasting, and great looking. The decals range from $15.95 to $36.95, so they're pretty reasonable also.
I hinted to Santa that I wanted a metallic pink Kitchen Aid with flame decals (I was only joking because I knew it wouldn't happen). The mixer I got was, and still is, awesome and pink. Now I know how to fulfill the rest of my wish.
*Full disclosure: FlameKA.com offers a 10% off coupon for anyone who links to the site. I'm not going to mess around with trying to redeem it, though.
[Via NotMartha]
Creating the ultimate Mother's Day gift for the carnivorous mom
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Gifts for the vegetarian (or vegetable-loving) mom
