Cooking

Stop mincing garlic and just get a fucking microplane. Thank you Rachel Ray.

Ah, the alchemy of the kitchen! A dash of efficiency, a sprinkle of passion, and a dollop of savviness. First off, mise en place - French for 'put in place.' Prepare your ingredients ahead of time, it can help remove a loot of stress.

Secondly, invest in a sharp knife - it's the Excalibur of the culinary world, turning the toughest veggies into paper.

Lastly, experiment! Like any good inventor, a chef isn't afraid of a few mishaps; it happens to the best of us! You'll surprise yourself with some of things you may come up with 😉

Taste as you go and taste everything! Understanding how the components of your meal taste is a great way to make yummy things. It also helps you learn how ingredients manifest in the end result and will help you expand your cooking versatility

@PoodleDoodle

• when dicing onions cut radially first, then slice across, it saves you that weird half slice that's traditionally used for dicing onions.

• I use cast iron for nearly everything, it survives a hundred years because it's bulletproof not because it's gingerly handled every time it's removed from it's velvet case. People dragged them around on Chuck wagons, you will not kill it with soap. Worst case it gets a little sticky and now you need to cook some bacon in it.

• A splash of acid in your soup or stew at the end really wakes it up.

• Never cook rice without at least a couple bay leaves. Ideally you'll cook it in chicken stock as well, add flavour where you can.

• The best chicken stock in a jar is Better Than Bullion. Hands down. No contest.

• With a splash of oil you can cook eggs even in a sticky cast iron pan.

• Always use hand protection of some kind with a mandolin. I've never seen a non-pro chef go without and not fuck up their hand. Even pros lose the tips of their fingers sometimes too.

• If you want to recreate movie theater popcorn at home you need the following things:
  A whirlypop or other stovetop cooker
  Coconut oil, refined
  Popcorn kernels, quality varies, find a good brand
  Fine salt
  "Popcorn oil" - this is butter flavored oil sold next to the kernels

Here's what you do, set up a bowl to dump your popcorn in, throw some salt in the whirlypop with a spoon of coconut oil, and just a tiny glug of the popcorn oil, not much just a tad. Add your kernels, crank the heat to high and start cranking. Do. Not. Stop. The popcorn will begin to pop after an interminable wait. Keep cranking until it either gets hard to crank or the popping slows down significantly. Then quickly dump your popcorn into the waiting bowl. Do not add salt, you already did this, the fine salt will be well distributed this way. Add a bit of popcorn oil. Shake the bowl a bit to distribute, add more if desired etc. Then enjoy your movie theater popcorn.

It took me years to work out how to do it without the Naks oil, which I bought from a local popcorn shop for awhile.

Boil spaghetti in a small amount of water in a frying pan. You won't need to push the pasta down and you'll have lovely starchy water to finish off your sauce — perfect for something like a carbonara!

Not really a hack but just something important, always remember to account for how much salt you need if you don't have the recipes specific type of salt because different salt types have different shapes and sizes

Clean as you go, don't just leave it all for the end. Onions are sauteing and you're done chopping everything? Good, wash your cutting board and knife and clean up any messes before the next step. Sausage is done browning and you're dumping it in with the onions for a minute with the garlic and some herbs? Great, wash that pan and spoon and set it down to dry and wipe up all the oil splashes.

Just makes clean up so much easier after you've eaten and you're much more efficiently using your time.

chicken (or vegetable) broth in lieu of water to cook rice.

Adding Knorr brand Caldo de Tomate to your rice cooker turns your plain old rice into Spanish rice. Blew my mind when I tried it.

pay attention. stay with what you are cooking as you are cooking it. don't let yourself become distracted. taste as you go. take notes. use unsalted butter. know your equipment and its pros/cons. shop at different stores for the best ingredients. fresh herbs are waaay better if you can swing it.

To caramelize onions quickly, sprinkle them with a small amount of baking soda.

There are still people who don't user probe thermometers. This is the single best cooking tip I can give:

• Get a probe thermometer (preferably a fast reading one).
• Use it.
• Know your temps.

• MSG. My favorite use for it is in soups. It only takes a small amount and it makes a significant difference.
• Slow cookers are awesome for preparing dry beans, infused oil, and roasting beets in aluminum foil.
• Know your emulsifiers and keep them handy. I always have a nice mustard as well as soy lecithin on hand, and if I’m ever worried about an emulsion breaking or I want a nice even sauce or dressing, I have at least one neutral and one savory option. Soymilk also works if it works for your recipe.

Probably known, but stainless steel cookware is the best you just need to make sure it's hot enough first before you start to cook. Drop a pinch of water in the pan, if it dances around you're good too go.

If you need to cool your pot down now pour running cold tap water on the outside of the pot. Not something you need when everything goes smoothly, but trying new recipies sometimes things go a little bit wrong and cooling the pot down quickly can save your dinner.

Running cold water will cool a pot to room temperature in seconds. Just beware if your pot is really hot cooling it down that fast could damage it. Should be fine at sensible cooking temperatures though.

To actually cook things enough. I wasn't cooking them to unsafe levels before, and please don't cook my steak above medium rare, but some foods just taste better cooked more. Almost no one cooks ground meats enough, who the hell wants grey beef, get some color on that bitch. Also if you cook sausage meat enough it gains color and the flat renders out a little it tastes better. Get some colour on those roast veggies and no one likes a pale insipid fry. A change in color is flavor, use it to your advantage. And yes sometimes you want your veggies firm and for the love of god don't overcook your garlic.

Just from a practical perspective: use your microwave as rarely as possible! Leftovers can be really amazing - sometimes as good or better than the original dish - but only when heated properly!