Come join the fun!

You may have noticed my lack of posting this summer and it’s all because I’ve been working hard on building a new website that I hope will serve as a useful resource for people interested in cooking. It’s all about making cooking accessible to cooks of all skill levels. I’ll share tips, tools and techniques in 150-word posts daily, as well as videos and lots of other fun things I’ll be adding in the coming weeks.

I hope you’ll join the party at www.cookingclarified.com!

How to Whip up a No-Bake Dessert

No-bake desserts are a lifesaver, especially during hot summer months. They can also be quick to put together, making them perfect for entertaining or pot-lucks.

You can make a super quick and easy classic dessert with your favorite cookies and ice cream. Leave the ice cream on your counter for about 15 minutes to soften it. Place one scoop in the center of one cookie. Top with a second cookie, pressing gently to spread the ice cream evenly between the two cookies. Roll the edges in cookie crumbs, chopped nuts, toasted coconuts or mini chocolate chips. Pop your sandwiches back in the freezer for 30 minutes before serving.

Check out No Bake Desserts to Die For for more cool ideas.

How to Grill with Flavor

There’s more to grilling great food than cooking over an open flame. Turn up the heat on your next grilled meal by adding one of the three basic ways to flavor grilled foods — marinades, rubs or sauces.

Marinades are usually a mix of oil and an acid like citrus juice or vinegar. Soaking food in a marinade, which can also contain herbs and spices, allows food to absorb all the delicious flavors in the marinade. Make sure that any marinade that comes into contact with raw meat or poultry not come into contact with cooked foods.

Rubs are mixtures of herbs and spices that are literally rubbed onto raw meat to add flavor. Some rubs are made with a little oil or liquid, just enough to make a paste that’s applied the same way as a dry rub.

Sauces are brushed on in the last few minutes of cooking. Applying them early on in cooking will cause them to burn before your meat is cooked.

For more tips on how to get your grill on this summer, check out Five Tips for Grilling Greatness.

How to Poach an Egg

For me, a poached egg is all about the yolk. Don’t get me wrong. I’ll eat the egg whites, but even at their perfectly plump and supple best they can’t hold a candle to my precious yolks. There’s not much better – where food’s concerned – than a warm, buttery poached egg yolk oozing like a river of creamy, golden lava over baby greens or a toasted English muffin with bacon or a pile of roasted asparagus sprinkled with crispy, crumbled prosciutto. Perfection on a plate.

Here’s how to make it happen:

1. Fill a skillet or sauté pan with enough water to cover the egg, about two to three inches.

2. Bring the water to a boil, then reduce heat to simmer, about 200° F (tiny bubbles instead of the big, rolling bubbles that come with a boil).

3. Stir in a teaspoon or so of white vinegar to help the white set faster. (Darker vinegars will also work, but you’ll be left with a darker colored egg that tastes like your vinegar.)

4. Crack your egg (make sure it’s still cold) into a small bowl or ramekin and gently slide it into the simmering water.

5. Leave the egg alone to cook for three minutes.

6. Carefully lift the egg from the water with a slotted spoon, draining any excess water onto a paper towel.

7. Enjoy!

Happy Father’s Day!

Here’s wishing the happiest of Father’s Days to all the great dads out there, especially to my fantastic husband! If you want to cook up a delicious dinner for your favorite Dad (we’re talking Grilled Rack of Lamb, Grilled Potato Skewers & Grilled Pineapple), check out my mouthwatering, dad-pleasing Father’s Day grilling menu.

How to Serve Prettier Plates

According to my 6-year-old daughter, I am now famous. Pick up the June 14^th issue of Woman’s World magazine and you’ll find my name on page four offering a few simple plating tips to make your home cooked meals look they were prepared and plated by the latest celebrity über-chef.

Why bother? Someone smart once said we eat with our eyes long before we eat with our mouths. And they were right. Creating a beautiful plate can make an ordinary dinner feel like a special occasion.

You can read my Woman’s World plating tips below, but here are a couple more to help you create prettier plates.

1. Plan Colorful Menus

Rice. Chicken breasts. Cauliflower. Tasty? Perhaps, but you’ll be hard-pressed to find a more boring or beige plate of food. Plan your menus to include foods in a variety of colors. You’ll not only have a more appetizing plate, you’ll likely have a healthier plate, as well. Colorful foods – think carrots, broccoli, tomatoes – are chock full of vitamins and antioxidants. Consider your plate a canvas. Fill it with delicious color.

2. Choose Plates Wisely.

You can never go wrong with a nice, white plate. A bright, white background will make your food the star of the show. If you do use colorful or patterned plates, choose colors that will complement whatever you’re serving.

Now I’m off to take full advantage of the fact that my daughter thinks I’m cool. As we left the grocery store with our copy of Woman’s World in tow, she turned to me and asked, “Mommy, do you think people are going to recognize you now that your name’s in that magazine?”

Any minute now, kid.

How to Pop Corn

Anybody else remember Jiffy Pop Popcorn and the excitement that came with watching that foil tin nearly burst at the seams as the popcorn popped and popped and popped on the stovetop? Jiffy Pop was all but replaced by microwave popcorn and what could be easier than that? Toss the small envelope in, press start and wait for all those additives, preservatives and faux butter to pop.

You can make your own microwave popcorn quickly and easily without all the extras. All you need is corn, a little oil and a brown paper sack. Here’s how.

Microwave Popcorn

1/3 cup unpopped popcorn

½ teaspoon olive oil

Pinch of salt

Pour popcorn into a brown paper lunch sack. (The kernels should cover the bottom of the bag in one layer.)

Drizzle oil over the kernels, then sprinkle with the salt. Fold the top of the bag over twice and place upright in microwave.

Cook at 100% power for two minutes. (Microwave power levels may vary. Cook until pops are about 5 seconds apart.)

Makes about 7 ½ cups of popcorn.

How to Make a Soufflé

My first experience with soufflés came during my very first hours working as an extern (code name for person who knows nothing and makes even less) in the kitchen at the now defunct La Colline. I’d watched the soufflé demonstration in cooking school, but weaseled my way out of actually making one by volunteering to work on another (less scary)  of the afternoon’s required recipes. I had no interest in tackling the terrifying mix of egg whites and custard. (And what was up with all that folding?)

Well, wouldn’t you know that my first assignment in a restaurant kitchen was to make three different soufflés? For about 200 people over two dinner seatings…on NEW YEAR’S EVE!  Um, ok.

So, here’s how it went down:

Chef: Get me 10 pounds of sugar. (pointing at two large bins of white stuff)

Me:  Ok.

Chef: Mix this with this. Set it aside, then mix that with that. The waiter will ask if guests want soufflés when he takes the initial order. He’ll tell you. You mix the base, but don’t put it in the oven until … (At this point, I am so completely overwhelmed with the task before me that I swear all I can hear is the sound the adults in Charlie Brown’s world make when they talk — wonk, wonk, wonk, wonk, wonk, wonk.)

In a nutshell, I was supposed to have three different bases ready to mix soufflés to order. No big deal, except that I had to mix and bake them in a shared oven (so much for keeping the oven door closed) and time them perfectly so that they were baked, plated, garnished and ready for waiters to whisk them to the guest’s table at just the right time, after the dinner dishes were cleared, but not too soon so that after-dinner drinks could be offered and delivered, and before they fell.

This is where my irrationally confident mojo kicks in. Instead of having a total and complete nervous breakdown, I am ready to go, cool as a cucumber. I got this.

As I’m standing there armed with a million whisks and my bases and meringue ready to go, Naughty Waiter walks past and violates every sanitation law in the books by dipping his pinky into my enormous bowl of fluffy meringue (this is why I call him Naughty Waiter) for a taste.

Naughty Waiter: Wow, that is REALLY salty!

ME: What the–(pushing rage aside) wait, what?

So much for I got this. What I got was 10 pounds of salt that Chef unknowingly whipped into the egg whites. It was ten minutes to service and I had to start all over. Confidence blown. Mojo had left the building.

In the end, I pulled it off. I lost count of how many soufflés I made that evening, but they all made it to the tables on time and delicious. Not one fell prematurely. I got nauseous just thinking about soufflés for about six months after that night and I still get nervous around large quantities of sugar and salt positioned too closely together, but I can make a soufflé with my eyes closed.

I am tough (you should see me with my knife). Soufflés are not and here’s the proof — 10 Tips for Making a Perfect Soufflé, as written by yours truly for FabulousFoods.com.

http://www.fabulousfoods.com/recipes/article/877/28601

How Buying Organic Saved Me Money

Yes, that’s right. I saved money on my weekly grocery bill by buying organic produce.

I’ve been gradually making the shift to buying organic foods for my family and trying to balance that with my weekly food budget. I worried that spending more for organic produce would break the bank. I was wrong. (Please, nobody tell my husband.)

As I made my way through the aisles of Mom’s (My Organic Market) I carefully chose a selection of veggies and fruits, imagining as I chose how I’d prepare or serve them and for what meal. At the register, my total was about a third less than my regular produce bill.

I realized that because I was concerned about cost, I only selected foods I knew I would use. I didn’t just grab everything that looked good or struck my fancy. I bought what I had a plan for and in addition to saving a few bucks (and having the cute courtesy clerk carry my organic swag to my car), at the end of the week I didn’t have to endure the dump of shame – that dismal end of the week ritual where I throw away the produce that went bad before I figured out what to do with it.

While I aspire to be like my organized and industrious friends who enter the grocery store armed with a detailed shopping list generated by a weekly menu, I’m not there yet. Baby steps.

My little experiment did make me wonder how much I could save if I did sit down and create a serious weekly meal plan, but that’s a story for another day.

Five More Kitchen Tools Every Cook Should Have

The long-awaited sequel to last summer’s list of five tools every kitchen should have (refresh your memory) is finally here. Now that you’ve undoubtedly rushed out to purchase all the things I recommended and now have a quality chef’s knife, cutting boards, pots and pans, tongs and assorted high heat spatulas, you’re ready to pick up five more kitchen basics that will help you out as you cook.

1. Measuring Cups & Spoons

As their name implies, measuring cups and spoons will help you measure out your liquid and dry ingredients. Measuring cups for liquids have a spout to make pouring easy. Measuring cups for dry ingredients come in sizes ranging from ¼ cup to 1 cup. Their tops are level so it’s easy to level off dry ingredients for accurate measurements. These are typically inexpensive so pick up several sets.

2. Mixing Bowls

Mixing bowls are great not just for mixing, but also for holding ingredients while you prep and for use as a garbage bowl while you cook. You can never have too many of these. Pick them up in different sizes and styles from plastic, to stainless steel or even ceramic or glass.

3. Sheet Trays

Sheet trays are not just for baking cookies. These rectangular pans have a raised edge on all four sides to keep ingredients in place. They can be used to roast vegetables, bake cakes or brownies and for baking cookies. Cookie sheets typically have a lip or raised edge on only one side to make it easy to slide your cookies from the sheet onto your cooling rack or platter.

4. Food Processor

While I’m not one to advocate using a food processor for simple tasks like chopping an onion, they do make quick work of things like chopping nuts, making bread crumbs and shredding or chopping vegetables in large quantities. Buy a food processor to fit your needs. Start small and work your way up to a larger, industrial version if you need it.

5. Mixer

Every kitchen needs a mixer. Whether it’s small and hand-held or a high-powered, countertop version, mixers come in handy for mixing batters, whipping cream and even getting rid of lumps in your mashed potatoes. If you don’t want to make a big financial commitment with a stand mixer, pick up a smaller, much less expensive hand-held mixer. If you find you’re using it frequently or that you’re tackling recipes that your handheld can’t handle, then you’ll know you’re ready for the heavier duty version.

Disclaimer

A well-stocked kitchen contains many more utensils than the ten listed here and in my previous post. This list is simply a springboard for beginning cooks who may not know where to start.