1. "I always buy my fish fresh from (insert reputable purveyor name here), so I know I'm getting the best."
2. "I never buy the frozen fish in those bags or vacuum packs. I don't think it's any good."
3. "I buy the freshest fish possible then freeze it at home until I'm ready to cook it"
Believing any of these myths may be doing you a disservice, costing you more money, or even putting you at risk for a foodborne illness. How?
--MYTH NUMBER ONE: "I always buy my fish fresh from (insert reputable purveyor name here), so I know I'm getting the best."
I know most good grocery stores and reputable markets have a beautiful fish counter laid out with a wide variety of un-frozen fish and shellfish held on a pristine bed of ice. Sometimes they even post a promotional/informational sign like "Flown in from the coast every morning!" This seafood is generally of an excellent quality, may be flown in daily, can reflect a high market price, and...was absolutely frozen rock-solid a few hours ago if your grocer is in accordance with the Ohio Department of Health Uniform Code which reads "Fish...may be offered for sale or service if
they are obtained from a supplier that freezes the fish as specified...." That's right, it has ALL been frozen. It has to be to ensure that the fish stays fresh and free of spoilage while in transit. In fact, most fishing operations have "flash freezing" facilities right on the boats, to lock in the freshness moments after the catch. The fish counter at the grocer's is there for your convenience...you can see the product more closely, you can compare it to other offerings, you can specify how large of a cut/portion you want, you can sometimes get some unusual or seasonal offerings, and you don't have to thaw it when you bring it home.
--MYTH NUMBER TWO: "I never buy the frozen fish in those bags or vacuum packs. I don't think it's any good."
Since we know that it has ALL been frozen, you do not necessarily need to side-step the frozen offerings. Do check the package for any "sell-by" dates, though. You can get some very nice frozen fish that is already cut and portioned (which is a real bonus for folks who are not confident with their filletting skills)
--MYTH NUMBER THREE: "I buy the freshest fish possible then freeze it at home until I'm ready to cook it"
Do NOT buy the already-thawed product at the fish counter and then re-freeze it at home. Re-freezing food increases the liklihood of food-borne illness and fish and seafood are so delicate and sensitive that this practice carries some risks. Try to cook the fish you've purchased within 24 hours. If you might not get to cooking it for, say, more like 48 hours, fill a pan with ice cubes, lay your fish on top, sprinkle it with more ice cubes, and hold it in the refrigerator. Laying it on ice does not re-freeze it, but it does keep it super-cold and allows it to hold the fresh flavor longer.
With some awareness about what's at the market and how it's presented, you can make decisions on what's best for YOUR dining needs.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Monday, July 19, 2010
En Francais...What Can I Say?
I own no less than five books on the subject of "The French Paradox". Surely you've heard of the French Paradox...the people of France (as well as some other Mediterranean nations) manage to eat butter, red meat, chocolate, and pastries, while washing it all down with red wine and still somehow manage to maintain figures like Sophie Marceau's and keep their national rate of heart disease and diabetes at an enviable level. The books decribe how the paradox is the result of "lifestyle" choices. We hear that rhetoric all the time, but what does it really mean?
So many people have a quick, dismissive answer:
-"Well, they smoke all the time. How healthy is that?"
-"Those poor French people don't have cars and they have to walk everywhere."
-"French women only eat once a day."
-"It's the red wine" (like that's a silver bullet)
-"It's the olive oil" (like that's a silver bullet)
I'm sure that you have noticed that there are plenty of fat, American smokers...so, cigarettes are not the answer. You must have a "power walker" in your neighborhood who, despite the long, exerting walks she takes every day, never seems to look any trimmer. And I'm sure some French women only eat once a day. Some American women eat once a day. Americans are still heavier, per capita. The red wine? My own personal experience is that daily alcohol consumption bloats one's midriff almost as effectively as daily bearclaw consumption. Then it must be the olive oil, right? I'm not a registered dietician so I cannot speak effectively about the metabolism of HDL and LDL, but I can tell you that when it comes to calories...a fat is a fat is a fat.
So, why do the French seem to get away with murder while we pitiable Americans indulge in a weekend dinner out on the town and find the scale has crept up 4 pounds by Monday morning?
I have the answer. And don't take my word for it. It's not my answer. I got this from a gracious, lithe French woman I sometimes have the privelege to cook for. She said the French are thinner and often healthier because...
IN THEIR LIFESTYLE, THE FRENCH TAKE PORTIONS THAT ARE SMALL BY OUR AMERICAN LIFESTYLE STANDARDS
This lady explained that at a buffet dinner, the French would take 1 slice of meat, while the Americans would take 2 or 3 slices.
This made me think of a simile...you know when you go to a really "fancy" restaurant and you get a teensy-weensy little plate with a flourish of chopped parsley sprinkled on top as a garnish and you feel cheated because you have to pay 32.00 for this appetizer-sized nothing of an entree???!!!. Well, that's probably a portion size closer to an average French-sized portion. If you think that's not enough to nourish you with your demanding life, think about the famous French artists, athletes, actors, scientists, and heads of state who seem to do just fine on less quantity at the dinner table.
This French acquaintance of mine also noticed that Americans often indulge in second helpings. If the stew was particularly good, we might have a second half-bowl. How many Thanksgivings have you gone back for just a little bit more stuffing? She tells me that the French rarely take second helpings because if you take one item, you must take all of them. Good manners dictates that you must make a complete plate or you have been totally rude to your host. (It's probably tantamount to, say, chewing with your mouth wide open or eating off of someone else's plate) Even if you have room for another slice of the divine roast...you must pass on second helpings if you think you'll be unable to also eat the starch and the vegetables. The French lifestyle and sense of etiquette says that "cherry-picking" second helpings is selfish and makes you look like a bumpkin.
While I was aware that French portions were smaller, I did not know that they usually declined second helpings. I find this insight, however small, to be incredibly informative. How many times do we lament our physiques, but have one more dollop of mashed potatoes after a long, hard day? How many times do we eat another half-serving of rice while cleaning up because it hardly seems like enough to save but it would also be a shame to waste...and then we cannot understand how our favorite pants keep "shrinking in the dryer"?
I don't want to discount the potential benefits of walking/exercising more, choosing healthful/non-saturated fats, having the occasional antioxidant-rich beverage, and so on, but when it comes to losing the spare tire, it's less about WHAT you are eating and more about HOW MUCH you are eating.
Try to do more on less.
That should be our new American lifestyle credo.
So many people have a quick, dismissive answer:
-"Well, they smoke all the time. How healthy is that?"
-"Those poor French people don't have cars and they have to walk everywhere."
-"French women only eat once a day."
-"It's the red wine" (like that's a silver bullet)
-"It's the olive oil" (like that's a silver bullet)
I'm sure that you have noticed that there are plenty of fat, American smokers...so, cigarettes are not the answer. You must have a "power walker" in your neighborhood who, despite the long, exerting walks she takes every day, never seems to look any trimmer. And I'm sure some French women only eat once a day. Some American women eat once a day. Americans are still heavier, per capita. The red wine? My own personal experience is that daily alcohol consumption bloats one's midriff almost as effectively as daily bearclaw consumption. Then it must be the olive oil, right? I'm not a registered dietician so I cannot speak effectively about the metabolism of HDL and LDL, but I can tell you that when it comes to calories...a fat is a fat is a fat.
So, why do the French seem to get away with murder while we pitiable Americans indulge in a weekend dinner out on the town and find the scale has crept up 4 pounds by Monday morning?
I have the answer. And don't take my word for it. It's not my answer. I got this from a gracious, lithe French woman I sometimes have the privelege to cook for. She said the French are thinner and often healthier because...
IN THEIR LIFESTYLE, THE FRENCH TAKE PORTIONS THAT ARE SMALL BY OUR AMERICAN LIFESTYLE STANDARDS
This lady explained that at a buffet dinner, the French would take 1 slice of meat, while the Americans would take 2 or 3 slices.
This made me think of a simile...you know when you go to a really "fancy" restaurant and you get a teensy-weensy little plate with a flourish of chopped parsley sprinkled on top as a garnish and you feel cheated because you have to pay 32.00 for this appetizer-sized nothing of an entree???!!!. Well, that's probably a portion size closer to an average French-sized portion. If you think that's not enough to nourish you with your demanding life, think about the famous French artists, athletes, actors, scientists, and heads of state who seem to do just fine on less quantity at the dinner table.
This French acquaintance of mine also noticed that Americans often indulge in second helpings. If the stew was particularly good, we might have a second half-bowl. How many Thanksgivings have you gone back for just a little bit more stuffing? She tells me that the French rarely take second helpings because if you take one item, you must take all of them. Good manners dictates that you must make a complete plate or you have been totally rude to your host. (It's probably tantamount to, say, chewing with your mouth wide open or eating off of someone else's plate) Even if you have room for another slice of the divine roast...you must pass on second helpings if you think you'll be unable to also eat the starch and the vegetables. The French lifestyle and sense of etiquette says that "cherry-picking" second helpings is selfish and makes you look like a bumpkin.
While I was aware that French portions were smaller, I did not know that they usually declined second helpings. I find this insight, however small, to be incredibly informative. How many times do we lament our physiques, but have one more dollop of mashed potatoes after a long, hard day? How many times do we eat another half-serving of rice while cleaning up because it hardly seems like enough to save but it would also be a shame to waste...and then we cannot understand how our favorite pants keep "shrinking in the dryer"?
I don't want to discount the potential benefits of walking/exercising more, choosing healthful/non-saturated fats, having the occasional antioxidant-rich beverage, and so on, but when it comes to losing the spare tire, it's less about WHAT you are eating and more about HOW MUCH you are eating.
Try to do more on less.
That should be our new American lifestyle credo.
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Kifli, Kolache, and Rugelach
Kifli, Kolache, and Rugelach... come again, please??
They are all cookie-sized pastry treats, Eastern-European in origin (Hungarian, Czech, Polish/Yiddish), usually crescent-shaped, filled with sweetened nuts or fruit preserves. Sometimes kolaches are made in the shape of what my mother would call a "thumb print cookie"...small, circular, and with a central depression holding gleaming preserves.
I loved these as a child. My old-world grandmother, who did many wonderful things in the kitchen, also baked from scratch every single day of her adult life. (Well, you have to have dessert, don't you?) She would often make kifli, which she called "horns". They were one of my favorite cookies. I loved the shape, as well as the fresh preserve filling (which she made regularly from the bounty of the big garden on their property).
I was recently asked to make some kolaches, so I set about finding or developing a recipe. I often start this process by talking to my mom, since she has a lot of my grandmother's old-style recipes which are hard to beat. Then, I scour the internet and a battery of cookbooks to compare and contrast subtleties in ingredients, ratios, and so on. Finally, I use all this information to draft my own interpretation of an item.
My mom's recipe seemed to have an unnecessary step, so I omitted that. Another recipe I found required the patience and gentle touch of a seasoned pastry professional, which was going to drive me and my spontaneous streak up the wall. After a fair amount of research, I found two variations of this pastry that I felt worthy of a test run.
The first variation included cream cheese as one of the fats that comprise the pastry dough. This is fairly common in rugelach recipes. It sounded like it would make a rich-tasting, yet tender-textured dough, so I got a batch of that going. The second variation just had butter and egg yolk (no cream cheese) in the dough, and appeared among sources I really trust, so that recipe was worth a go. I also shaped these cookies both as crescents and as "thumb-prints".
I had a more challenging time working with the cream cheese dough. It was very fragile. It had to be kept very cool while working it, which was not easy during this summer heat wave, and required an exacting touch when spooning out the preserves and creating crescent shapes. The butter dough was more forgiving. I feared, however, that it would somehow be lackluster or run-of-the mill...lacking in complexity. But it was considerably easier to work this dough to the appropriate thickness to allow for the right amount of overlap when making the crescent shaped cookies.
During the baking process, the cream cheese dough wanted to expand a little bit (the dairy ingredients give the dough a little puffiness), which made some of the crescents strain their horn-shape and come undone. There was nothing really wrong with them, but they looked sort of homespun. The thumb-prints fared well, though. The butter dough more or less stayed put...in the way that a pie crust would. The butter dough crescents, therefore, looked more attractive, like something you'd buy at a pastry shop.
The final taste-test surprised me. I thought the cream cheese dough would be superior. The cream cheese dough had a nice, tender texture, to be sure, but it also had a very slight aftertaste. My hypothesis is that with a substantial amount of a dairy product in the dough, you can discern the lactic acid, which is a little sour. Side-by-side with the butter dough, which tasted rich but neutral, and had a totally acceptable level of flakiness, I felt that the butter dough came out the victor.
Keep this in mind if you bake, or if you get called upon to do one of those dreaded Christmas-cookie exchanges. When making kifli, kolache, rugelach, or some similar pastry/cookie, you'll want to remember that for ease of manipulation and superior taste, butter dough wins out (unless you have a sentimental attachment to cream cheese dough because your Grandma Mildred always did it that way). And if you are not the patient or dexterous type, do make the thumb-print variation. They taste just as lovely and require less skill and handling (read: you'll be done in half the time).
They are all cookie-sized pastry treats, Eastern-European in origin (Hungarian, Czech, Polish/Yiddish), usually crescent-shaped, filled with sweetened nuts or fruit preserves. Sometimes kolaches are made in the shape of what my mother would call a "thumb print cookie"...small, circular, and with a central depression holding gleaming preserves.
I loved these as a child. My old-world grandmother, who did many wonderful things in the kitchen, also baked from scratch every single day of her adult life. (Well, you have to have dessert, don't you?) She would often make kifli, which she called "horns". They were one of my favorite cookies. I loved the shape, as well as the fresh preserve filling (which she made regularly from the bounty of the big garden on their property).
I was recently asked to make some kolaches, so I set about finding or developing a recipe. I often start this process by talking to my mom, since she has a lot of my grandmother's old-style recipes which are hard to beat. Then, I scour the internet and a battery of cookbooks to compare and contrast subtleties in ingredients, ratios, and so on. Finally, I use all this information to draft my own interpretation of an item.
My mom's recipe seemed to have an unnecessary step, so I omitted that. Another recipe I found required the patience and gentle touch of a seasoned pastry professional, which was going to drive me and my spontaneous streak up the wall. After a fair amount of research, I found two variations of this pastry that I felt worthy of a test run.
The first variation included cream cheese as one of the fats that comprise the pastry dough. This is fairly common in rugelach recipes. It sounded like it would make a rich-tasting, yet tender-textured dough, so I got a batch of that going. The second variation just had butter and egg yolk (no cream cheese) in the dough, and appeared among sources I really trust, so that recipe was worth a go. I also shaped these cookies both as crescents and as "thumb-prints".
I had a more challenging time working with the cream cheese dough. It was very fragile. It had to be kept very cool while working it, which was not easy during this summer heat wave, and required an exacting touch when spooning out the preserves and creating crescent shapes. The butter dough was more forgiving. I feared, however, that it would somehow be lackluster or run-of-the mill...lacking in complexity. But it was considerably easier to work this dough to the appropriate thickness to allow for the right amount of overlap when making the crescent shaped cookies.
During the baking process, the cream cheese dough wanted to expand a little bit (the dairy ingredients give the dough a little puffiness), which made some of the crescents strain their horn-shape and come undone. There was nothing really wrong with them, but they looked sort of homespun. The thumb-prints fared well, though. The butter dough more or less stayed put...in the way that a pie crust would. The butter dough crescents, therefore, looked more attractive, like something you'd buy at a pastry shop.
The final taste-test surprised me. I thought the cream cheese dough would be superior. The cream cheese dough had a nice, tender texture, to be sure, but it also had a very slight aftertaste. My hypothesis is that with a substantial amount of a dairy product in the dough, you can discern the lactic acid, which is a little sour. Side-by-side with the butter dough, which tasted rich but neutral, and had a totally acceptable level of flakiness, I felt that the butter dough came out the victor.
Keep this in mind if you bake, or if you get called upon to do one of those dreaded Christmas-cookie exchanges. When making kifli, kolache, rugelach, or some similar pastry/cookie, you'll want to remember that for ease of manipulation and superior taste, butter dough wins out (unless you have a sentimental attachment to cream cheese dough because your Grandma Mildred always did it that way). And if you are not the patient or dexterous type, do make the thumb-print variation. They taste just as lovely and require less skill and handling (read: you'll be done in half the time).
Saturday, July 10, 2010
Turkish(?) Coffee
I love Turkish coffee. It is strong, bitter, and feels like a treat in the same way that a morsel of really good, really dark chocolate does. It also kick-starts your energy level like nothing else I know. So some mornings, when I really want to get up and go, I make myself a cup.
At least, I think I am making myself a cup of Turkish coffee. I learned the technique from a Serb, not a Turk. When Yugoslavia was torn apart by civil war in the early 1990's, I met a young Serbian refugee at a wild party that featured bowling down a long apartment hallway (Ooof...I pity the building's superintendent). I was pals with Vladimir for a whole Cleveland winter before he headed to a warmer state to settle down in. Vladimir took me to a Greek Orthodox Christmas dinner, taught me how to say unrepeatable things in his native tongue, and taught me how to make Turkish coffee. The housewives in Serbia, he said, drank cup after cup of the stuff all day long. Now that's a "kaffee klatch"!
It really couldn't be easier to make a good, strong cup of coffee:
-Take two and a half times the amount of water you need and put in a saucepan. For example, if you want to finish with 2 cups of Turkish coffee, start with 5 cups of water.
-Add to this DOUBLE the amount of coffee you would use for a standard brew.
-Add 1-2 scant teaspoons of sugar. Please note that this doesn't really sweeten the coffee in a substantial way. It just takes the edge off the bitterness and adds some complexity.
-Bring this to a boil, whisking frequently to incorporate the coffee grounds with the water.
-When it looks well-mixed and it's going at a roiling boil, pull off the heat and pour through a fine mesh strainer directly into a coffee cup. (I do this over the sink because sometimes pouring out of a saucepan is awkward and messy)
-Enjoy your hot, strong coffee
I have no idea if this is exactly what they do in the exotic cafes of Istanbul, but it certainly is an easy way to make a powerful cup of coffee. And after you have finished your cup, it's fun to pretend you can read your coffee grounds just like a gypsy fortune-teller, and make sure to predict that you will have a dynamic and lucky day after enjoying this delightful rocket-fuel!
At least, I think I am making myself a cup of Turkish coffee. I learned the technique from a Serb, not a Turk. When Yugoslavia was torn apart by civil war in the early 1990's, I met a young Serbian refugee at a wild party that featured bowling down a long apartment hallway (Ooof...I pity the building's superintendent). I was pals with Vladimir for a whole Cleveland winter before he headed to a warmer state to settle down in. Vladimir took me to a Greek Orthodox Christmas dinner, taught me how to say unrepeatable things in his native tongue, and taught me how to make Turkish coffee. The housewives in Serbia, he said, drank cup after cup of the stuff all day long. Now that's a "kaffee klatch"!
It really couldn't be easier to make a good, strong cup of coffee:
-Take two and a half times the amount of water you need and put in a saucepan. For example, if you want to finish with 2 cups of Turkish coffee, start with 5 cups of water.
-Add to this DOUBLE the amount of coffee you would use for a standard brew.
-Add 1-2 scant teaspoons of sugar. Please note that this doesn't really sweeten the coffee in a substantial way. It just takes the edge off the bitterness and adds some complexity.
-Bring this to a boil, whisking frequently to incorporate the coffee grounds with the water.
-When it looks well-mixed and it's going at a roiling boil, pull off the heat and pour through a fine mesh strainer directly into a coffee cup. (I do this over the sink because sometimes pouring out of a saucepan is awkward and messy)
-Enjoy your hot, strong coffee
I have no idea if this is exactly what they do in the exotic cafes of Istanbul, but it certainly is an easy way to make a powerful cup of coffee. And after you have finished your cup, it's fun to pretend you can read your coffee grounds just like a gypsy fortune-teller, and make sure to predict that you will have a dynamic and lucky day after enjoying this delightful rocket-fuel!
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
Did James Bond's Gadget Man, "Q", Stock Your Kitchen?
I admit it, I'm a Luddite. The Downies were the last family in America to get color TV when I was a wee lass, and the die was cast. I try to be progressive, but really, I think that we, as a people, can do a lot more with a lot less. (This from the woman who once pulled out her aging cell phone during the dawn of the i-pod and got a guffaw and the comment: "Is that one of those old steam-powered cell phones?!") But I stand fast and contine to hold the opinion that we can do more with less regarding our kitchen appointments as well.
While I hold a certain fondness for some ridiculous kitchen gadgets (it amuses me to think of British Royals using their sterling silver asparagus holders), I have little sympathy for the chump who spends his hard-earned dollar on others (a Salad Shooter? Really??!) The all-American entrepreneur/capitalist is always looking out for a new tool to sell the public, and we are only too eager to buy, however questionable its practicality.
Will kitchen gadgets make you a better cook? Make cooking easier for you? Maybe, but probably not. The mere act of cooking more often will make you a better cook AND will reveal shortcuts that ultimately make cooking easier for you.
And now I will tell you the biggest kitchen equipment secret out there. (And please note that this is absolute HERESY) You do not need top-of-the-line/restaurant-quality in every piece of equipment you own.
Don't bake all that often? Great. You don't need a stand mixer.
Don't prep for 15 every day? Terrific. Try one of the less-expensive food processors.
The only thing you use your range for is scrambled eggs? OK...Then why are you looking at the pro model with 20,000 BTU's?
I'm not trying to bring our economy to a screeching halt. You can still buy stuff for the kitchen. How about 3 really good knives? They cost a hundred bucks a pop because they stay sharp. Any Boy Scout leader and any good cook will tell you that a sharp knife is a safe knife...and way more pleasurable to work with. You can also buy a great cutting board. You'll get my seal of approval on a few decent pots and pans. They don't have to be the most expensive or prettiest ones in the store...just good, solid conductors of heat. Don't forget one good cast iron pan. It doubles as a grill and a bread-maker. Properly taken care of, it will outlive your grandchildren. It will be the best $35 you've ever spent at the hardware store (but you can go to a fancy cooking store for the ambience, if you'd like). If you want to spend some big bucks, a good gas range with a properly-vented hood is quite nice.
If you still want to buy more gadgets, you'll get my approval on a cheap food processor. You probably don't need the restaurant-grade Robot Coupe when the Sears version will last you 10-15 years for regular home cooking. Get a good grater or microplane and enjoy it. Splurge on an immersion blender and vow to do pureed soups all winter long. A double-mesh strainer helps make lovely sauces, if you take the time to do that. Dutch Ovens are expensive, but oh! What a lovely roast they make! I personally don't use slow-cookers very often but they are useful to many cooks I respect, so enjoy one if you are so inclined. I want to hate the fondue pot for its relative cost-to-use ratio, but if you have an annual fondue party, nothing works better. If you are trying to keep your husband home on the local watering hole's "wing night", do invest in a small deep fryer and make your Buffalo-style chicken wings. Foreman-style grills look contemptible, but they do make a decent panini. A mandoline can be handy. (But even so, a good cook with a good knife can do nearly as well.)
I can't quite see the logic in so many other things. I've already mentioned the salad shooter. I hate the mini-chopper. (The knive has already been invented.) No self-respecting artisanal baker owns a bread machine. Cake turntable. (I just turn the cake round by hand. Works every time). Egg Poacher. (You can poach an egg in almost any vessel that will receive heat)
I don't want to rain on your parade. I'd just rather see you spend your discretionary cash on a nice vacation rather than on a quasi-useless kitchen gadget. But DO keep cooking and take inspiration from your grandparents and great-grandparents...who turned out flaky strudel with a rolling pin on the dining room table...who made perfect Thanksgiving turkeys with the "wrong" kind of roaster...who peeled apples and vegetables with a good little paring knife and not a fancy ceramic peeler with the ergonomic handle color-coordinated to their granite countertops. *sigh*
While I hold a certain fondness for some ridiculous kitchen gadgets (it amuses me to think of British Royals using their sterling silver asparagus holders), I have little sympathy for the chump who spends his hard-earned dollar on others (a Salad Shooter? Really??!) The all-American entrepreneur/capitalist is always looking out for a new tool to sell the public, and we are only too eager to buy, however questionable its practicality.
Will kitchen gadgets make you a better cook? Make cooking easier for you? Maybe, but probably not. The mere act of cooking more often will make you a better cook AND will reveal shortcuts that ultimately make cooking easier for you.
And now I will tell you the biggest kitchen equipment secret out there. (And please note that this is absolute HERESY) You do not need top-of-the-line/restaurant-quality in every piece of equipment you own.
Don't bake all that often? Great. You don't need a stand mixer.
Don't prep for 15 every day? Terrific. Try one of the less-expensive food processors.
The only thing you use your range for is scrambled eggs? OK...Then why are you looking at the pro model with 20,000 BTU's?
I'm not trying to bring our economy to a screeching halt. You can still buy stuff for the kitchen. How about 3 really good knives? They cost a hundred bucks a pop because they stay sharp. Any Boy Scout leader and any good cook will tell you that a sharp knife is a safe knife...and way more pleasurable to work with. You can also buy a great cutting board. You'll get my seal of approval on a few decent pots and pans. They don't have to be the most expensive or prettiest ones in the store...just good, solid conductors of heat. Don't forget one good cast iron pan. It doubles as a grill and a bread-maker. Properly taken care of, it will outlive your grandchildren. It will be the best $35 you've ever spent at the hardware store (but you can go to a fancy cooking store for the ambience, if you'd like). If you want to spend some big bucks, a good gas range with a properly-vented hood is quite nice.
If you still want to buy more gadgets, you'll get my approval on a cheap food processor. You probably don't need the restaurant-grade Robot Coupe when the Sears version will last you 10-15 years for regular home cooking. Get a good grater or microplane and enjoy it. Splurge on an immersion blender and vow to do pureed soups all winter long. A double-mesh strainer helps make lovely sauces, if you take the time to do that. Dutch Ovens are expensive, but oh! What a lovely roast they make! I personally don't use slow-cookers very often but they are useful to many cooks I respect, so enjoy one if you are so inclined. I want to hate the fondue pot for its relative cost-to-use ratio, but if you have an annual fondue party, nothing works better. If you are trying to keep your husband home on the local watering hole's "wing night", do invest in a small deep fryer and make your Buffalo-style chicken wings. Foreman-style grills look contemptible, but they do make a decent panini. A mandoline can be handy. (But even so, a good cook with a good knife can do nearly as well.)
I can't quite see the logic in so many other things. I've already mentioned the salad shooter. I hate the mini-chopper. (The knive has already been invented.) No self-respecting artisanal baker owns a bread machine. Cake turntable. (I just turn the cake round by hand. Works every time). Egg Poacher. (You can poach an egg in almost any vessel that will receive heat)
I don't want to rain on your parade. I'd just rather see you spend your discretionary cash on a nice vacation rather than on a quasi-useless kitchen gadget. But DO keep cooking and take inspiration from your grandparents and great-grandparents...who turned out flaky strudel with a rolling pin on the dining room table...who made perfect Thanksgiving turkeys with the "wrong" kind of roaster...who peeled apples and vegetables with a good little paring knife and not a fancy ceramic peeler with the ergonomic handle color-coordinated to their granite countertops. *sigh*
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
