Comment by Austin Hemmelgarn on What exactly are American recipes containing...
@Marti Which fits all the points I listed (even with pork being the primary meat). Quoting specific products like that is less than useful for people internationally (the OP explicitly mentions they...
View ArticleComment by Austin Hemmelgarn on What can I use for a binding agent in salmon...
@Sedumjoy In case it helps, Konjac is mostly a Japanese thing, though it’s also used in parts of China and Vietnam. Carrageenan is mostly a Filipino and Indonesian thing. Both of them, as well as agar...
View ArticleComment by Austin Hemmelgarn on How to make Kraft Mac and Cheese Like Ihop
On the last point, my guess if they’re not using butter would actually be lard. In many dishes you can substitute it 1:1 for unsalted butter, and a lot of people will prefer the version with lard in a...
View ArticleComment by Austin Hemmelgarn on What is the proper way to prepare a cup of...
@StuperUser The ISO methodology is particularly interesting because so many people seem to misinterpret it. It’s not meant to make a good cup of tea, it’s meant to make a consistent cup of tea to allow...
View ArticleComment by Austin Hemmelgarn on Vanilla extract with pure alcohol
@quarague The solubility of most things is dependent on the degree of polarity of the solvent. Water is strongly polar compared to most alcohols, so things that are hydrophilic (such as most metal...
View ArticleComment by Austin Hemmelgarn on Can you replace red wine with apera/sherry in...
Huh, never heard of Worcestershire sauce in ragu/bolognoese, though I guess it makes a little sense if you want an additional source of acid and umami aside from the tomatoes and/or meat. I’d probably...
View ArticleComment by Austin Hemmelgarn on Can you replace red wine with apera/sherry in...
I would argue that the issue that lead to the use of ‘Apera’ was not EU ‘shenanigans’, but everyone else’s ‘shenanigans’. It’s no different from how real Champagne wine is from Champagne (that’s where...
View ArticleComment by Austin Hemmelgarn on Can you replace red wine with apera/sherry in...
@XanderHenderson Sugar isn’t too unusual if you can’t get good tomatoes that are appropriately sweet to make the sauce, and some people even add a bit to offset the ‘punch’ of the tomato paste (often...
View ArticleComment by Austin Hemmelgarn on Larvae in pine nut container, safe to eat?
@ReineAbstraktion Many people have a strong aversion to consumption of insects, so for a question like this you’re bound to get mixed answers. For the record, the statement in this answer that they are...
View ArticleComment by Austin Hemmelgarn on What is the most accurate cheap way of...
@GlennWillen Not really constant (because differences in how the individual particles settle will still happen with sifted powders, and any sizable mass will still compress), but it should be orders of...
View ArticleComment by Austin Hemmelgarn on How can I remove the smell of bicarbonate of...
For the record, sodium bicarbonate has no odor at all. Any atypical smell in the final dish will be the result of some reaction between it and another ingredient during the cooking process.
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for If you add spices to boiling pasta, will it...
It depends on the spice, and how exactly you add it.As a general rule, if the spice dissolves well in water, you can do this with it, though you will only get a subtle flavor this way, and most stuff...
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for When trying to fry onions, the edges burn...
Two things I note about your picture based you your stated outcome of crispy onions:The pieces are rather big. Onions have a very high moisture content, which means that the larger the pieces are the...
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for Safe to cook with alcohol
As a general rule, the answer by Chris H is accurate. Most recipes that involve wine only use a small amount and typically involve cooking in a way that causes most of the alcohol to evaporate (or...
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for Is panko just pretentious breadcrumbs?
Panko is, in the traditional sense, breadcrumbs made using crustless Japanese bread (actually an evolution of West European bread, as bread came to Japan via Portuguese explorers and merchants) in such...
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for Can I dissolve mint in water and drink it?
In pure water, no plant matter will actually dissolve. You can get close by forming a suspension (this is how green tea made using matcha is made, as well as hot cocoa), but it will not actually...
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for How to know what variety of tomatoes will be...
I have never succeeded from making great tomato sauce using our native tomatos and the final product always tastes flat. When I eat the tomato, there is always 0 hints of sweetness in them and not much...
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for I accidentally put my canned tuna in the fridge
There are only a rather small handful of cases where refrigerating some type of food is potentially problematic. They generally fall into one of four categories:Certain lipids congeal or solidify when...
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for What type of mint in tzatziki?
It refers to spearmint in this case.You can find both spearmint (Mentha spicata, known in Greek as δυόσμος) and peppermint (Mentha × piperita, generally known as μέντα, though that may be used for...
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for How can I improve my noodle soup?
Based on your recipe, things I would change:Instead of boiling, bring the water to a boil, then immediately drop to a simmer. Cooking things too hot too fast almost always results in degradation of...
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for What do American chefs mean by "Red pepper...
As a general rule, whether flakes or ground, when an American recipe calls for ‘red pepper’ as a spice, it means the Cayenne cultivar of Capsicum annuum. This is a moderately hot pepper, typically in...
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for How do I make boiled or steamed veggies and...
Look beyond what you’re thinking of here as available cooking methods. It’s possible to braise or stew meat dishes without any added fat for example, and this is a great way to bring out additional...
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for What can I call this Swiss Chard side dish...
If the menu actually provides descriptions of dishes, then I would just use the Italian name and describe it in English. This is very normal at least in the US for dishes from international cuisine,...
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for Are whole dried Shiitake sufficient for...
This comes down to one simple question: Is the flavor you are getting while leaving them whole sufficiently strong for your tastes?If the answer is yes, then just keep doing what you’re doing.If the...
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for Peanut butter and Jelly sandwich - adapted to...
Firstly: what type of bread? Must it be white, brown, wholemeal or granary? Are there any significant differences between bread in the US and UK?In general, the type of bread you would use for a...
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for Why do people generally discard the upper...
There are three factors that I know of which contribute to this:The flavor of the whites and the greens is different. If the dish relies heavily on the leek for flavor, and it was intended to be made...
View ArticleAnswer by Austin Hemmelgarn for Adult hot milk stirrers
What is the recommended liquorThat really depends on the flavor you want. Based on my own experience with this type of thing though, I would tend more towards lower-proof alcohols. The strongest stuff...
View ArticleComment by Austin Hemmelgarn on What were historically commonly used cooking...
@jogloran No, it’s actually a really good example. If you go and try to make tempura using lard, or tallow, or olive oil, or peanut oil, it will taste distinctly different from authentic Japanese...
View ArticleComment by Austin Hemmelgarn on Is there a simple method to calculate added...
@AaarghZombies Pretty much all food oils and fats have a lower smoke point (the temperature at which they start burning) than boiling point (in fact, for most of them any boiling point is only...
View ArticleComment by Austin Hemmelgarn on Serious device for making hummus at home
I would add that a consumer grade food processor is a very useful thing to have around the kitchen, especially the nicer ones that provide attachments for things like shredding or slicing. It can be...
View ArticleComment by Austin Hemmelgarn on When would a cook reach out for a mortar and...
@Sam7919 It’s not unusual if the spices are part of a garnish as well as for flavor that you want them non-uniformly crushed/ground and also probably want them in larger pieces (so they’re easier to...
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