Archive for the ‘Cooking’ Category
Culinary school isn’t for everyone – no matter how appealing it sounds to be able to work with top chefs, improve your skills and learn to create really top-quality dishes – because most people don’t intend to become professional chefs and the time and cost involved in attending a full time school just isn’t worth it when you cook recreationally. That said, there are many at-home chefs who want their skills to be on-par with those of “real” chefs and one way to learn those techniques, recipes and skills is by signing up for an online cooking school. Online cooking schools have sprung up over the past couple of years, offering anyone with a computer and a good internet connection the chance to watch video lessons on everything from basic knife skills to roasting the perfect chicken. These schools are intended to give you a solid base in these skills, not just to entertain you with stories (like most food tv shows do). They’re less expensive than full time culinary school and can be done on your own schedule.
The Wall Street Journal recently took an in depth look at three online culinary schools to see how their online classes – which are aimed at home cooks looking to get culinary school skills – compared and whether they were worth the investment: Top Chef University, Rouxbe and Culinary Institute of America Prochef Podcasts.
- Top Chef University got a thumbs up for their impressive range of subjects, with more than 235 lessons and over 60 hours of video content. The instructors vary by lesson (former Top Chef cast members), but the skills demonstrated were all detailed and lessons were packed with useful tips. The classes are broken into 12 courses and you’re encouraged to complete them in order. It was $199.95 for one year/$24.95 per month for one course at a time.
- Rouxbe is an online only school with more than 75 classes and over 1,000 videos. They were praised for their polished videos, attention to detail and very thorough lessons that walked you through every detail of the techniqes. A discussion forum with staff and other users provided a classroom-like atmosphere, too. $299.95 for one year/ $4.99 per lesson for 90 day access or $9.99 per lesson for lifetime access.
- Culinary Institute of America Prochef Podcasts were not organized into neat courses to follow like the other schools. Instead, these engaging videos allowed you the freedom to pick and choose what topics you were most interested in without being encouraged to view them in a certain order. All videos were taught by CIA instructors, though there were no quizzes, etc. like the other schools offer and no way to really track your progress. $4.95 per podcast
The WSJ didn’t really rank these schools because with their different styles they will appeal to people looking for different things. They’re all worth checking out, however, to get a little bit of that culinary school skill set without leaving your own home.
The term “half and half” shows up very frequently in cooking and baking recipes in the US, but it is not particularly well known outside of the US (or the term refers to something completely different). When it appears in a recipe, it sometimes generates a little confusion as to what it is. “Half and half” is a mixture of half heavy cream and half whole milk that is commonly found in the US. Heavy cream has a fat percentage of about 35% and that concentration of fat is what helps stabilize it when you whip it into whipped cream. Half and half has a fat percentage around 12% and, although much thicker and creamier than milk, it will not whip up into fluffy whipped cream like heavy cream will.
The rich, creamy consistency of half and half is ideal for adding to black coffee to lighten it up without watering it down and for adding to soups to enrich them. It can be used in place of milk in many recipes, such as cakes and quickbreads, and will give baked goods an even finer, more tender crumb than they would typically have (although it is worth noting that the extra fat can create a product that is too rich and even slightly greasy occasionally). My favorite application for half and half is in ice cream, where may recipes will call for both heavy cream and milk. Using half and half saves me a step when mixing up my ice cream base, it also saves me a step when writing the recipe because I can call for one convenient ingredient rather than two separate ones.
You can substitute for half and half by mixing half whole milk and half heavy cream. IF you live in a county where “light cream” is widely available, know that it has a slightly higher fat content than half and half and should be mixed with approximately one third whole milk to make a substitute for half and half.
With just a few exceptions, most baking recipes call for butter to be softened or at room temperature. Softened butter spreads easily onto bread and toast, and it whips up into a fluffy mixture with sugar that helps produce a fine, tender crumb in baked goods. Chilled butter is too hard to cream into sugar easily and melted butter simply begins to dissolve the sugar, and does not create the light mixture produced by creaming.
The best way to soften butter is by leaving it out on the counter for an hour or so before you will need to use it. The exact time will vary depending on the temperature in your kitchen and in hot weather your butter will soften much more quickly than in cold! Softened butter should yield easily to a gentle squeeze of the wrapper and it should have an easy-to-spread consistency, so that a butter knife can easily cut through it and scoop some up. The butter should not be so soft that it cannot hold its shape or that it has begun to melt. If it is very hot, keep a close eye on softening butter so that it does not over-soften and pop it back into the fridge before it gets to that point if you’re not ready to use it.
If you need to soften your butter quickly, it is not a good idea to pop it in the microwave for a few seconds. This can melt the butter and, while it will probably not have a big impact in a batch of chocolate chip cookies, it actually can impact the fluffiness of the crumb in a cake recipe. The best thing to do is to chop the butter up into small pieces, as they will soften faster than a whole block of butter. You can put the pieces into a mixing bowl and beat it (starting on low speed) with a mixer or the paddle attachment of a stand mixer to encourage it to soften. A few minutes of mixing along with 10-15 minutes of sitting out in small pieces should soften the butter enough to use in a recipe.
During a heat wave, most of us aren’t thinking about turning on our ovens and baking up a couple of batches of cookies. That prospect is not nearly as appealing as it is during the winter, when the idea of working in front of a warm oven sounds very appealing. In the summer, we want air conditioning, refreshment and, most importantly, nothing that will make us hotter than we already are – even if a freshly baked chocolate chip cookie still sounds tempting. Here are a couple of recipes, sweet and savory, to help beat the heat during a heatwave:
Put that ambient heat to good use and turn your oven into a car with a batch of Car Baked Chocolate Chip Cookies. When it is over 100F outside, the interior of a car can reach up to 180F when left in the sun – hot enough to do some long, slow baking. The cookies turn out just like they would from the oven! You won’t need to turn on your oven and you’re car will smell like freshly baked cookies when you’re done, too. Oatmeal cookie fans can try Car Baked Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies instead of the original.
Classic s’mores are a great summer treat if you’re camping, but if you don’t already have a roaring fire going, try a S’mores Ice Cream Terrine instead. This layered dessert has all the elements of a s’more in a much more refreshing format. The terrine is made with ice cream, fudge sauce, marshmallows and graham crackers and it really does capture that s’more flavor! It can be made well in advance and served to a crowd for dessert or simply saved for treating yourself on a warm afternooon.
Homemade Ice Cream Drumsticks are another great frozen treat for summertime. Starting with store bought sugar cones, you can easily customize this ice cream truck favorite with any kind of ice cream you like. Simply press the ice cream into the cone and shape it into a neat scoop. Chill, then dip into chocolate to coat. You can even dip the unset chocolate into chopped nuts, shredded coconut or sprinkles to give it a sundae-like look! These are another treat that keep very well in the freezer if you take the time to make a good sized batch of them.
Outdoor cooking is a lot more appealing than indoor cooking when it is hot. You don’t need to heat up your oven, and standing in front of a 500F grill actually makes you feel cooler! Grilled Pizza is a great summertime option and alternative to burgers and sausages. The dough can be made in advance and it only takes a couple of minutes of cooking on each side to finish the pizza. Keep the toppings light, because they won’t have as long to cook as they will in the oven.
Finally, one last summertime favorite is gazpacho. This chilled tomato soup is not only refreshing, but uses up lots of fresh-from-the-vine tomatoes when they are at their best. Salmorejo is a type of Spanish gazpacho that uses a lot of olive oil and has bread incorporated into the soup mix. These two ingredients make the gazpacho exceptionally creamy, while keeping the great tomato flavor and losing none of the refreshment of the dish. You can also make a watermelon gazpacho for something with a sweet and spicy finish to it!
Sweetened condensed milk is evaporated milk that has a significant amount of sugar added back to it to make a very thick, sweet product that is often used in ice creams, pies and other creamy desserts. It comes in full fat, low fat and fat free varieties. Most recipes simply call for sweetened condensed milk and are usually designed to work with the full fat product, but since sweetened condensed milk is fairly high in fat and calories, a lot of bakers and cooks wonder about substituting in the low fat or fat free version.
When it comes to baking, there is a difference in using full fat, low fat and skim milk because even a small amount of added fat from the milk can really increase the moistness and tenderness of the finished product. Sugar also does this. Sweetened condensed milk and its lower fat counterparts are very similar in consistency, and all of them still have a very high amount of sugar and that extra-creamy texture. That richness and high sugar content will keep baked goods made even with fat free sweetened condensed milk moist and tender. It is also primarily used in custards or other creamy dishes, rather than in cake and muffin recipes, where the creaminess and sweetness of the milk, rather than the fat content, are the most important elements. Because of these factors, sweetened condensed milk is generally a good candidate for lower fat substitutions in recipes that call for a full fat product, as you’ll still get the same (or darn close to the original) result.
In ice creams, puddings and bar cookie recipes, I’ve always had great results using lower fat sweetened condensed milk. Fat free sweetened condensed milk will thicken when an acid – such as lime juice – is added to it, just as the full-fat variety will, so it works well in fillings for key lime and other pies. I will also use it in Thai iced tea or iced coffee for a slightly lower fat (but still sweet!) drink.
