What are the best practices you’ve learned to save time or make a meal better.
Ok I might get downvoted to oblivion but I use MSG. It enhances the flavors so much that I have stopped going to restaurants.
Edit- I did my research and found no credible source that says MSG is harmful.
Edit2- If you go to a restaurant or order KFC chances are they use MSG as well
Uncle Roger agree with you!
There is nothing wrong with MSG. It being bad for you is made up by racists.
Anti-MSG propaganda actually comes from Asian racism, and was born out of the idea that Chinese food with its MSG was causing headaches and other health effects that were entirely made up. MSG is perfectly fine for you, and it makes a ton of things even tastier. I use it all the time in home cooking.
- Nothing goes on a plate without being tasted
- If it’s too sour, add sugar
- if it’s sweet and you haven’t added acid, add a splash of vinegar.
- if it’s too hot, add fat
- if you burn it, throw it out.
- IF you taste it early, it should taste weak. If it’s fantastic when when it starts to simmer, it’ll be too harsh once it’s reduced.
- Taste it and it tastes empty or boring? Smell it. Smell all your herbs/spices on hand, which ever one it smells the closest to, add a healthy pinch and salt if it doesn’t taste salty already.
- know your oils and use the right ones. Olive oil can handle some heat and is great for savory, grapeseed is almost flavorless. Canola has a distinct flavor that doesn’t go with everything.
- season your meat before you cook it.
Only thing I’d add is that, on 8, learn what rancid oil smells like. Most people keep things like olive oil in poor conditions (that’s without us even getting into quality of oil, or how people buy FAR MORE oil than they’ll reasonably be able to use), and the oil goes bad far faster than they think it will.
Biggest hack? Realizing that humans have been cooking for millennia, and that it’s in the best interest of big business to convince you that it’s difficult/expensive/extremely complicated.
You don’t NEED the fancy equipment every company out there is trying to sell you.
Not everything needs to be gorgeous on the plate, or a whole production to make.
The poorest people in the world cook delicious food every day.
For instance, you don’t need NEED a +$150 Japanese chef knife to cook at home. What you need is something that can hold an edge through general maintenance, a whet stone, a kitchen towel to dry off your blade immediately after you hand wash it, and a little bit of patience.
IKEA sells some surprisingly great single construction (steel blade, steel handle) knives, and their single body chef knife is like $25. Just get an honing rod for use before you start slicing, and a whet stone for periodic sharpening (there’s TONS of YouTube videos of all the different ways of sharpening your knife), and remember to wash and hand-dry after you’re finished. My chef knife cost me barely anything, and I’ve used it for years and years, and it still slices through a tomato without a problem. Also, I only cook for myself, so I can absolutely 100% guarantee my whet stone will “outlive” me.
Don’t be afraid of spices. Use more than you think is necessary. Onion and garlic can make a meal 100x better.
Not good advice with certain hot peppers.
To each their own
Mandolines are not you friend. They thirst for blood.
Seriously if you get one get a safety mandoline like the once for all brand.
Kevlar glove.
Or pair it with a pair of kevlar gloves or similar. But yes, every commercial cook I know says the worst kitchen incident they’ve seen involved a mandolin.
Alton Brown recommends a Kevlar glove when using a mandolin.
Can confirm.
If you’re American, you don’t want to have to pay an ER bill when you slice the tip of your finger off, like I did.
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.
If you cook by using a cooking recipe you can be creative (within reason). If you BAKE by following a baking recipe stick to the letter!
I teach my kids that cooking is art and baking is science. You have to be precise with measurements in baking, not so in cooking.
Add salt as you cook, not all at the end.
You can make a delicious, calorie dense chicken noodle soup on an extreme budget with canned chicken, chicken broth, and ramen noodle packages. That meal kept me from going hungry on multiple occasions during college.
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
Replace everything plastic with glass.
Generally I completely agree, but I do have an embarrassingly large number of deli containers in various sizes. Great for leftovers or drinking water.
Reverse taring - instead of placing the bowl on the scale and taring before weighing, place your ingredients on the scale and tare, and you can then scoop out and see the negative weight of how much you have used. This is especially helpful if you are trying to weigh an ingredient into a hot pan you can’t just set on the scale
Bake bacon on cookie sheets at 375 for about 20 minutes. You can make a ton of bacon very quickly, with almost no mess, and all the bacon is perfectly flat. We have a double oven and we can make about 4 pounds of bacon in about 30 minutes this way. :)
Cookiesheet bacon is the best! If you like it crispy it helps to broil it for a minute or so at the end of cooking it.
And then save the bacon grease in a jar to add to gravys! I add a tablespoon or so to my sausage gravy for biscuits and gravy and it is freaking delicious. Can also use it to grease a cast iron pan before making a pizzookie for a little extra flavor.
Does this not splatter all throughout the oven?
Yes and no. A substantial amount of grease will be aerosolized and condense on the interior of your oven when it cools. It’s nasty looking and the next three cakes you bake will taste slightly of bacon. You can decide whether that’s a bug or a feature.
If I could figure out how to make my electric smoker get to 375F I would only do bacon outside in the smoker as I essentially have to clean the over every time I do bacon in it. And, yes, you can smoke bacon. It’s not bad, but it also is a bit more like jerky than the crispy bacon I like. Again - bug/feature territory.
No, it does not splatter throughout the oven.
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.
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!
This goes against my intuition of years of making pasta. But I’ll try it nonetheless.
Another fun fact, you barely need enough water to cover the pasta and it doesn’t even need to be boiling to be working. If you just slightly more than cover the spaghetti with water it heats up much faster and therefor you are done cooking much faster. No need for a giant full pot.
