Do you love to cook and want to learn more about it, but don't really have the time or inclination to go to culinary school? Maybe you just need to fill in some of the gaps in your self-taught education. There's a new online resource that could really be for you.

Called Rouxbe (pronounced roo be), this wesite offers cooking lessons, short video tips, and step by step video recipes. One aspect I really like about Rouxbe is that it focuses on technique but then supplies a recipe to go along with that technique. That is exactly like culinary school. There, you learn a technique and are then expected to be able to apply that to any recipe that you come accross. There's also a store and a community/forum section.

You have two basic membership options: free or premium, which is $99 for one year or $199 for a lifetime membership. The free membership level will get you access to text recipes and the drill-downs (videos featuring techniques and tips), and you get recipe previews and one free cooking lesson. To get full recipes and access to all cooking lessons you have to get the premium membership. Sure, it's no substitute for culinary school if you have career ambitions, but $99 is quite reasonable for an online culinary school if you really want to get cooking.

[Via Accidental Hedonist]

Kate, the Accidental Hedonist, has posted a neat trick that will enable you to choose the better ice cream when confronted with brands that you have never tasted before at the market. The trick is to weigh the (frozen) containers, since ice cream is sold by volume, not weight. In other words, if a manufacturer churns more air into his or her product, it will fill up a bigger container without using up extra products. By weighing the cartons of ice cream, you can choose a higher quality brand that will taste richer, creamier and better than a cheaper one.

There are different grades of ice creams that are based on overrun, which is the term for the amount of air mixed into the product. The cheapest ice creams have 90 to 100 percent overrun - meaning that they are half air - while premium ice creams have 60-80 percent and super-premium ice creams can have anywhere from 10-40 percent. Some air in the ice cream is good, as it lightens up the texture and keeps it from being a dense, chewy mass, but it's just silly to pay $5 for a gallon of ice cream when you're really only getting a quart. Next time, weigh the containers or just go for the ice creams labeled as "super premium" when you are looking for high quality indulgence. Your taste buds will thank you.

Kate, the Accidental Hedonist, may have compiled the most comprehensive list of potato tips, tricks and how-to's that has been seen on a food blog, if not in other forms of media. Any question you had relating to potatoes can certainly be found on the list, which includes such tips as:

• Choose potatoes that are firm, smooth and fairly clean
• Storing potatoes below 40 degrees F will allow the potatoes to have a sweeter taste, yet will result in a darker look when cooked
• Oiling the skin of a baked potato prior to placing in the oven will ensure a crispy skin.
• Russet potatoes are best for baking.

The only things Kate has not included are potato recipes, but a few other blogs (including Slashfood) can step in to fill that void:

• Patatas Bravas
• Gratin Dauphinois
• Loaded Potato Skins
• Microwaved Potato Chips
• Rustic Potato Chowder

Kate just announced the 2005 Food Blog Award winners on her new site. Congratulations to all the nominees and thanks to everyone who voted. Without further ado, the winners are:

• Best Chef's Blog: Eggbeater
• Best City Blog: David Lebovitz
• Best Blog Covering the Food Industry: Food Whore
• Best Blog Covering Wine, Beer or Spirits: Vinography
• Best Food Blog - Humor: Food Whore
• Best Food Blog - Photography: Nordljus
• Best Food Blog - Recipes: Chocolate & Zucchini
• Best Food Blog - Restaurant Reviews: Becks & Posh
• Best Food Blog - Theme: Gluten Free Girl
• Best Food Blog - Writing: Chocolate & Zucchini
• Best Group Food Blog: Too Many Chefs
• Best Non Blogging Food Site: Epicurious
• Best New Blog: Delicious Days
• Best Post: Meat comes from Animals; Deal with it, or eat Vegetables
• Best Overall Food Blog: Orangette
  

Please take a chance to review all the nominees, as the competition was stiff this year and everyone nominated does a fantastic job all year long.

The Accidental Hedonist has just announced that the voting is now open for the 2005 Food Blog Awards. The polls will be open from January 5th through January 18th, with the winners to be announced sometime shortly thereafter.

The list of finalists was compiled from large lists of nominees by a panel of judges, who selected their favorites. The favorites were compared and narrowed down even further in a second round of judging until there were five finalists in each category. Each blog that made it to the finals is excellent, though many of the nominated blogs are at least equally good, so review all the nominees if you have a chance. 

Click here to place your votes!

 In this week's food section, the LA Times managed to do put together a very respectable piece on some very specific food blogs, such as candyblog and DeepEndDining, both of which happen to be Los Angeles based. I'm a fan of many of the sites that were mentioned.

Unfortunately for other bloggers, they managed to insult the interest, effort content and sincerity of most, if not all other food bloggers. The first few lines say it all:
"It was fun to pore over the gastronomic musings at the Accidental Hedonist or I Was Just Really Very Hungry.... But quicker than you could say blogosphere, the world of blogs-by-dedicated-foodies got crowded, repetitive, overly precious and just plain dull."

I've been fiercely opposed to the chemically-altered and highly sweet high fructose corn syrup for years, and it's amazing to me that, as long as it's been known to have serious affects on health, contributing to rising obesity and diabetes rates, it's still ubiquitously available in foods. It's super sweet, and it's cheap.

Kate Hopkins from the Accidental Hedonist is, like me, a long-time member of the anti-HFCS camp. She's developed an exceedingly well-researched answer to a reader's question on how to argue the HFCS case when many corn industry marketing folks rave about how "natural" the product is.