Is cooking for your family starting to drive you nuts? Cooking shouldn’t be a frustrating experience! Here you will find some excellent cooking ideas that will help you remove the stresses of not knowing where to begin. When you apply these tips, you’ll wish you had known about them sooner.
Try drying your own tomatoes. You can do this by slicing your tomatoes about a half an inch thick, or Romas in half. Place them cut-side up on a rack that you use for cooling, and add a little salt. Next, the tomatoes need to spend about 10 hours in an oven set to 190 degrees. Put a cookie sheet under the rack before it goes in. You can store your dried tomatoes in a plastic bag in the freezer. Alternatively, dried tomatoes can be packed in a jar filled with olive oil and fresh herbs. Place in the refrigerator and consume within two weeks.
Would you like to cook with fresh basil? Try placing clumps of fresh basil into a clear, glass container. Cover the stems with water. The basil will stay fresh for a matter of weeks on your windowsill or kitchen counter. If you change the water occasionally, the basil will even grow roots in the water. Trim the basil once in a while so it grows even more and stays fresh.
Take excess fat off of stews and soups. You can reduce the amount of fat in your stew or in the broth of your soup by allowing it to cool. As the dish cools, the fat will congeal on top and you will be able to remove it with a slotted spoon. Place an ice cube in a spoon and slowly skim the spoon across the surface of the soup or stew. The excess fat will affix itself to the ice. Alternately, use a paper towel to blot the fat.
Keep your spices and herbs in a dry cupboard. Exposure to light, heat and humidity can cause them to lose a lot of their flavor very fast. Exposing the spices to these kinds of conditions can enable them to lose their flavor.
For a delicious take on pie crusts, bake them for longer than the recipe calls for. It will help if you achieve a darker, more delicious golden caramel color, rather than stopping when the crust is still pale. The golden color is a sign that the sugars in the crust have finally caramelized.
Preparing foods with brine can add an interesting flavor to your cooking. You soak your poultry in a this seasoned salt water bath for at least an hour before cooking in order to enhance the natural flavors of the bird.
Keep a few pointers in mind if you plan to attempt cooking with skewers. Avoid round metal skewers and stick to square or twisted types.
Keep the bone in the roast if you want it to cook faster. The bone holds heat and helps cook the interior of your roast, speeding up the entire process. Once it’s finished cooking, you can plate up your meat after simply trimming around the bone.
To save time, prepare your future meals in advance. Many recipes include ingredients that can be prepared a few days in advance. Some ingredients even benefit from advance preparation, developing a better flavor that will enhance the quality of your meal when you cook it. Once you get in the habit of advanced prep, you may never return.
Regular meal preparation can seem like a major chore at times. Hopefully, the suggestions you have learned in this article will simplify your time in the kitchen. When it comes to mealtime, relax, because help has arrived.