Not too many people don’t enjoy sitting down for a nice meal. What makes this time even more enjoyable is a skilled cook in the kitchen preparing the meals. This article should provide some tips that can help both the novice and the expert cook.
To prevent wasting costly meat, test out your spice mixture on one small piece prior to adding it to the rest of the meat. Meats like meatballs, hamburgers or meatloaf can be easily under or over seasoned. Don’t cook it all at once after you have seasoned it. A better option is to season the small piece and allow it to cook. After trying the piece, you can cook the rest of the batch or adjust the seasonings that are needed.
Invest in a knife sharpener to make cutting any ingredient simple. Blunted knives do not cut things well, and they can also pose a safety hazard. If you’re trying to slice a firm vegetable with a blunted knife, you’re more likely to cut yourself with it than you are if you use a sharp knife.
Cooking Methods
Boiling and other lengthy cooking methods strip vegetables of their important nutrients. When you use faster cooking methods, such as steaming and sauteing, vegetables keep more of the nutrients intact. The best way to make sure you get all the vital nutrients housed within veggies is to eat them raw.
Try adding cauliflower to your mashed potatoes to lower the fat content. Cauliflower’s bland taste makes it easier for it to blend with the potatoes, so that you can’t taste it, and it picks up other ingredients. At the same time, cauliflowers mash into the same color and texture as potatoes, giving you a fail-proof way to add vegetables and subtract calories from a classic mashed potato dish.
Are you cooking using fresh basil? Take a bunch of the basil and set it in a glass. Fill the container with enough water to cover the stems. The basil can remain fresh for several days if it is placed in indirect sunlight. Change the water once in awhile, and before long roots will even form on the basil. To encourage growth, you can trim some of the leaves to use in your cooking.
These seasonings can also add unexpected flavor to other foods. You can sprinkle it on scrambled eggs or on roasted nuts and seeds for a snack. No one will know how you made that tasty food!
Chicken Broth
You should use chicken broth when you are cooking your vegetables. Simmering vegetables in the broth will keep them from adhering to the bottom of the pan and also infuse them with rich flavor. There is not a lot of expense when buying chicken broth, and most grocers carry it.
As you have seen from this article, anyone can learn to cook with the correct techniques. You are wrong if you think you have to have extensive training to be a good cook. Anyone with a desire to cook can learn the basics and then improve on them. You now have the tools to take on your first major cooking experience.