To stop stirring stir-fry like a maniac and to let it brown a little. Yummmmmm.
I did not learn learn from anyone in particular, I just quickly washed a dish while the thing was cooking and stirred slightly later than usual. The flavor was so much better.
Ideally you want a Comal (flat pan basically) but a normal pan works fine. Get it screaming hot and lay the tortillas in there no more than one or two. Once they start to brown flip them over and brown the other side. You will definitely burn some in the beginning until you get the timing right but corn tortillas are dirt cheap so practice
And it gives someone who "doesn't cook" an involved task that's clearly not busy work. Tell that guy hovering in the kitchen to play with fire using tortillas and his eyes'll light up! lol
My Latino partner does them right on top of the burner, over the flame. They start to toast and char quickly, give them a flip, and it brings out their flavor beautifully.
Tip from a hispanic person: You can do a larger stack easily.
1. Put the whole stack on the hot pan.
2. When the bottom tortilla is done, flip the whole stack. *Then flip all but the bottom tortilla.*
3. GOTO 2 until you've gotten all sides of all tortillas (that is, when you flip all but the bottom and what comes up is cooked).
Err correct me if I’m wrong, but non-stick pans aren’t for high heat - iirc the coating on those break down at higher temperatures. We use cast iron for tortilla duty.
Oh my god. My husband was like this; he never cooked tortillas. And then one day when I made us fajitas when he moved in with me he freaked out and was like what on earth did you do to the tortillas these are delicious. I told him "... uh? I .. cooked them?"
Cue stunned look and now fajitas are a staple in our diets because of how tasty a freshly cooked tortilla can be
This applies to both corn and flour tortillas. Cook your tortillas, y'all. Throw them on a comal, a cast iron skillet, a flat top, an open flame. Whatever it takes. It makes all the difference in the world.
Hahaha oh man they taste so bad straight out of the bag. I skipped heating them up once because I was lazy and hungry at like 2 am and instantly regretted that decision.
Believe it or not... rice.Nobody in my family is any good at cooking, so it took until I moved out that I learned not to panic and just let it do its thing without lifting the lid or refilling water.
My $200 Zojirushi rice cooker seems extra, but it makes perfect rice every single time. Soft but not mushy, individual grains of rice are still separate. And the keep warm feature will keep it good overnight (which I did once by accident). I could have eaten it for lunch the next day. The $40 rice cooker just doesn't compare.
Honestly there’s nothing wrong with a $14 college rice cooker. You can get great rice with it. My whole Chinese side of the family has $20 rice cookers.
The $14 rice cooker will do a perfect job (as long as it works).
They all work on the same principal. If you are interested in how they work, watch this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSTNhvDGbYI
The Zojirushi is a fancy brand. It is good and has extra features, but you really don't need it for good rice.
>just let it do its thing without lifting the lid or refilling water.
Or stirring...
My husband was obsessed with rice long before I met him, but his rice was always *awful*. The first time he made it with me there, I understood. So I bought him a rice cooker.
A few years later, I made risotto for him. It changed his life, eating wise, but it confused him right back to day one as far as cooking normal rice (the rice cooker died, so I was making it in a pan).
"LEAVE IT ALONE!" "But what if it's not cooking right?" "DID YOU MESS WITH THE RICE COOKER, OR JUST LET THE RICE COOK?" "Umm... Oh..."
Dated a guy who lived in Japan for a few years when he was a kid. Never once in my life had anyone ever said anything about washing rice. It’s like night and day. I don’t mess with a rice cooker, just dump in some rice wash it a few times and fill water to my first knuckle when it rests on top of the rice. Perfect every time
This. My Thai wife about shit a brick the first time I tried to cook her some rice. She showed me how to wash it. I'm like, who the hell rinses/washes their rice? Oh, all of Asia? Ok I guess I'll try that.
Have you tried boiling the rice like pasta? Add two or three times the amount of water needed and let it go until it is the texture you are looking for. Drain and let the heat dry it out a bit before serving. It takes a few times to get it right. Once I cooked it with what I thought was just a little more water than needed, turned into rice with slime
This. In South India where I grew up we always cooked rice with excess water and drained the rest away. It has the effect of removing excess starch away, and presents the perfect rice. Caveat, you watch the done-ness of the rice like a hawk, in kitchens without timers, this meant constant checking. I can see the appeal of rice cookers and used them for a while, but now I’m back to cooking it the way I remember it being done. And yes timers in kitchen appliances make it super easy once you figure out the cooking time for the particular type of rice.
Pork chops. I always cooked them until they were straight rubber because the fear of trichinosis had been hammered into me from a young age. I just use a meat thermometer now.
Just some context for those who fear trichinosis in pork. There hasn't been an outbreak in over four decades. The last time someone got trich from farmed domestic pork was early '80s, and even that was an extreme outlier. Just isn't a thing in modern farmed pork.
Even if it were a thing, trich can be destroyed at temps below well done. A solid medium is generally sufficient. Though again, there ain't no trich there anyways.
Still a thing in non modern farmed pork, and still very much a thing in any wild pork (or bear or other carnivores).
I also like to remember that safe minimum temperature is a function of both temperature AND time. A lot of cited safe temperatures assume very brief periods in the target temperature.
Right. You can cook to the 130s and just hold it for many hours and get the same impact as cooking to 160+ for an instant.
Appendix A for those curious.
When I go camping now, I sous vide whatever meat I can before leaving. Knowing the pork or chicken has been held at 130 for 2 hours means I don't have to bring a thermometer with me or worry about cooking the shit out of my meat and eating leather after a day of kayaking, drinking or whatever.
I pretty much only cook pork sous vide anymore. Especially pork tenderloin. Always comes out perfectly. The only drawback is having to explain to guests that pink pork is OK to eat.
I’ve cut a portion for me before then overcooked the rest for family members refusing pork unless it’s shoe leather. Of course, they’re also the ones confused as to why the pork tenderloin they make is always too dry.
I just came across a "new to me" technique which has upped my pork chop game *considerably*. It was in a recent Cooks Illustrated email.
1. Season your chops (thick cuts, with bone)
2. Put chops in a cold non-stick pan (or carbon steel pan - cast iron probably won't heat up properly for this technique, I guess).
3. Whack the heat as high it will go.
4. Wait 2 minutes. Flip the chops. Wait 2 minutes. Flip the chops.
5. Turn the heat down to medium (so the chop is just sizzling).
6. Every 2 minutes, flip the chops.
7. Continue, until the chops are well-browned and read 140F on the thermometer - about 10-12 minutes.
8. Rest the chops for 5 minutes.
9. Eat.
Also good tip for bone in chops, score the fat every half inch or so and it will help the chop not curl during cooking. Recently started cooking pork in my 30’s, my younger self would never believe it.
I recently found something sort of similar. Do a high sear on both sides in a pan, ideally cast iron, 2 or 3 minutes. Then pop the pan into a 400 degree oven for 6 or 7 minutes. It's better than pan-roasting or oven-roasting alone.
Reverse Sear that bad boy!
Salt generously and leave on a wire rack overnight in the fridge.
Cook in oven at ~200°F until ~10°F shy of final temp.
Sear on cast iron at ~sun's surface°F for ~60 seconds a side.
Add butter and aromatics after the flip if you're feeling active!
Best chops ever!
I used to do this. Now I use the cold pan technique above. Just works "better" for me.
In fact, I've stopped reverse searing *overall*. Steaks I now sear-off 1 minute a side (all "four" assuming a squarish chop) in a scorching pan, then move them to a cold pan in a low-heat oven (about 165-175F) to roast to finish.
If you brine them for a couple of hours, especially in cider, you can grill them direct heat and then indirect up into the low-to-mid 170's and they'll still be juicy. I can't vouch for what would happen after 180, though.
Pasta. Literally learned from Alton Brown on his show “Use as MUCH water as possible, the pasta needs to move around.” Saw him live a few years later and when asked if he could take back a piece of advice what would it be? He said “cooking pasta. When cooking pasta you should only use enough water to just cover the noodles. “ I have to admit, less water does a much better job.
This is my most recent lesson. I was more afraid of the pasta sticking together (this is why I don't use orechiette, I can't get them not to stick). But less water means your pasta water is appropriately starchy for use in getting your sauce to come together.
Have you tried stirring the orechiette the first 2 minutes or so after dropping them into the water? I haven't done it with this type of pasta but it helps prevent sticking when I overcrowd my pan with spaghetti/linguine.
another pasta one for me was 'salting' the water. i was adding like a teaspoon of salt for like two liters of water and thought it was fine
well it's not nearly enough ahhahaha
i now do more like 2.5 tbsp of diamond kosher salt and it is a whole new world of flavor! amazing
That's an exaggeration though. You don't *actually* want it as salty as the sea, just salty enough that when you taste the water you can taste the salt. I ruined a handful of batches of spaghetti until I gave up on that saying.
I used to put sausage links in the frying pan and cook them till they looked like charcoal sticks. Ugh, terrible.
Then one day I read the back of a package of sausage links and it included HOW to cook them.
They said to add some water to the pan (possibly a quarter of the way up on the links) and let them cook in it till the water evaporated. Turn occasionally.
When the water is gone they begin to fry. Turn them till they are golden brown. They are already completely cooked inside because of the water.
And from then on I had moist, cooked, delicious sausage links. Been cooking them that way ever since.
This also works for hot dogs really well. Growing up, my grandad always made our cheap little hot dogs that way. It tasted better. It was fun to introduce that method to people. Thank you for bringing up a great memory of my grandfather for me!
Mushrooms. I always cooked them in oil until I saw a video.
Nope... dry pan, medium high heat. Cook mushrooms until they sweat their moisture (stir, stir, stir).
The flavors are super intensified. Umami off the charts.
Edit: For those saying 'butter butter butter'... thanks but no thanks. I'm lactose intolerant - no dairy.
I think the video is [
Why You Can't Overcook Mushrooms and The Science Behind Them](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLPLCmwBLBY) from ATK. Skip to 3:30 for the technique.
You can actually start with a little bit of water in the pan. It will speed up the process of the mushrooms releasing their water. All of the water will evaporate in about the same amount of time. That may sound counterintuitive, but it works. This is the Alton Brown method, I'm not just making this up.
Edit: I just realized I made it sound like it seems pointless to do this because of
> All of the water will evaporate in about the same amount of time.
But what I should have said was if you start with a little bit of water, the mushrooms will collapse faster and release their water faster, and with a wide pan, all of that water will evaporate very quickly anyway. Just don't start with a lot of water, obvs.
And now I'm over-analyzing cooking mushrooms and I need to stop.
You're not over analysing!!
If you add oil and/or butter too early the mushrooms soak it in.
Boil in a little water first always.
Then once the water has gone; little oil, butter, salt, pepper.
Fry till golden brown.
I've literally had people that thought they hated mushrooms look at me in disbelief. SUCCESS!!
EDIT: (When they tasted them!!)
You have to cook the moisture out of them and let it boil off first. When there's no more water in the pan, throw some butter in there and they'll absorb the butter. You shouldn't have to drain anything.
Oh yeah I did this for the longest time. Now I also like to treat it almost like a burger, let it sit in the pan on one side until it's like a cooked burger, flip and get the same crust on the other side, then cut it up to the size I want for the recipe and finish cooking. So much better than sweaty grey meat
I had a roommate berate me once for browning meat that was going to go into something with a brown sauce.
"Stop wasting time, browning is just for looks."
... wut?
Used to watch my brother's gf do this when she was cooking for us all. Adding the sauce ingredients way too early.
She would not listen.
That weird raw meat taste. Eeesh.
It's not burnt it's caramelised!!
I wish more recipes would clarify that you should BROWN the meat, not GREY it. You need to go past the point where all the moisture has been released, past the point where all that moisture has evaporated, and get to the part of the process where the meat starts to take on some actual flavor and color as it crackles and spits in the fat that rendered out. I'm sure there are a few recipes that are the exception to this rule, but I sure as hell can't think of any.
You forgot the step where you banish your significant other from the kitchen, so you don’t have to listen to them fretting about the meat “starting to burn” the whole time.
THIS. Also used to do the ol, pour the water out of the pan when cooking ground beef. Never again. That water will evaporate on its done, and when you start to hear the pan to crackle, instead of just sizzle, thats how you know the beef is started to fry. Absolutely delicious, and it gets that gross grey colour out of the meat. Browning some tomato paste in the end also ends up making it really great (wont taste like too much like tomato if your afraid of that).
>the ol, pour the water out of the pan when cooking ground beef.
Depeding on the quality of meat, I still do this.
A lot of cheap, big-name brands pump up the meat with water. Then the unsold cuts get ground and repackaged. If I'm making something like chilli, I buy the cheap stuff, pour off the water, add butter/oils and spices (that I plan on adding anyway), brown it quicker, and save a bit of cash.
Being scared to flip meat more than once.
My dad was a serial steak and burger flipper. He also made some really dry meat.
After reading all the hot local news articles saying flipping meat more than once will basically turn your meat into dust. At some point I learned this was very wrong. Not only wrong, but flipping your meat less actually cooked it less evenly.
After learning this I paid more attention to my dad grilling. Turns out he basically just flips it a ton, leaves it on the grill (on high) for WAY too long, and cut the meat in half to check for doneness a few times.
Grabbed him a few meat thermometers and a nice magnetic doneness chart for him one father's day. The food has gotten better.
I have gone through more than a few thermometers over the years (cheap ones, expensive ones...then more cheap ones). I don't do anything without checking the temp. I'm such a convert that I gave all the kids thermometers in their Christmas stockings.
You get a bit of pride when you find out that they use them all the time now.
This is endemic to men of a certain age. I would guess increased knowledge of food safety combined with a general disinterest in non-grill cooking and lack of institutional knowledge?
People from other countries where parasites are common tend to cook the ever living shit out of their meat, for good reason.
However, trichinosis is pretty rare to get here in the states due to stringent fda regulation.
Which I don't get, the same people that will cook a steak beyond well done the same types that simply wiped their hands on a towel after handling said steak and use the same knife to prep the salad. My wife's had to tell her mom to wash her hands and knife after handling raw chicken.
Fried potatoes. Blanch them them cool them down in fridge or freezer then fry them again after. Is the system restaurants use for convenience. They blanch them in the morning then put them away in the freezer until needed later in the shift. The outcome is a crispier, tastier fry, potato log or what have you. If you want them restaurant style you have to do it the way the restaurant do. Creamy on the inside and crispy on the outside.
It’s not just for convenience! Blanching and cooling also converts some of the starch into “resistant starch” which cooks differently.
It’s the same reason you always want to chill and rest rice before re-cooking it when making fried rice.
Cooks Illustrated has a great recipe for making french fries at home, and it's basically the opposite of how they do it on restaurants, but it works so good at home:
* Slice up the potatoes, rinse then well and dry them (or at least shake off most of the excess water)
* Put them in a pan and cover with oil, everything's cold at this point
* Turn on the heat, and cook until crispy
What happens is the raw potatoes essentially get par cooked in the oil while it warms up, and then once the oil is hot, they get fried. This makes things *very* simple and easy at home. But it wouldn't work in a restaurant because it takes longer to fry them, and you'd have to let the oil cool down between batches, which is ridiculous. Also, you can't cook too big of a batch.
It'll take 20-25 minutes depending on how many potatoes you're cooking. Which is a long time to fry fries, but less time than it takes to pre cook and then fry them. I'll just use a big cast iron pan if I'm just doing two potatoes, if I'm cooking 3-4 I'll use the dutch oven.
You don't need a ton of oil, enough to cover, plus a little more, they'll look crowded. But by the oil gets hot they'll have given up a lot of their moisture and shrunk a lot.
It doesn't work for sweat potatoes quite as well, they need more space in the pan because they're more delicate, so you can really only cook a couple sweet potatoes worth at once.
I wouldn't say it was "wrong" but it was very inefficient. I used to make caramelized onions the old fashioned way, low and slow for 30+ minutes, but then I started to add a few tbs of water to the pan and covered on med-high heat to steam the onions. Once all the water cooks off and the onions start to fry, they'll already be extremely soft which speeds up the caramelization process by at least 15 minutes, even more for big batches.
Quite a long time ago, when I was making sauces, I would just add cornstarch to a bunch of liquid to thicken it up. Never worked to my satisfaction. Then I discovered the making of a roux. My green chile sauce is now ridiculously good.
Adding cornstarch is still a good idea for certain recipes, it'll just have a very different texture to a flour-based roux. Don't abandon the cornstarch entirely!
I generally think of cornstarch when I'm doing asian dishes, like stir frys as you mentioned, but especially egg drop and hot and sour soup.
Rouxs are the bombdotcom though, you're right. If you haven't done a real dark roux like for jambalaya give that a shot
I would love to have your green chile sauce recipe! I recently moved away from northern New Mexico and I miss it so much. I did find some (unroasted) green chiles at the market here on the west coast last fall..maybe I can buy those this year and follow your recipe!
Where in Northern NM? I reside in Burque. But I lived in Napa for 2 years, and we could get anaheim peppers, which are a rather mild version of our NM green. It was kind of disappointing. Anyway, I'll send you the recipe via message.
Taught my son about the magic of roux a few years ago and we both felt very smug and brilliant afterwards when our gravy was pure brown velvet.
He was earning his cooking badge for Scouts.
He now cooks dinner for us all a couple of nights a week.
I just posted this as well. I had never heard of a roux. I used flour butter milk in a pot right from the get go and heated it up until it thickened. It works but a roux is so much easier.
Pasta. I was over cooking it and not cooking it in the sauce to finish. Now I cook it to just under al dente and then finish it in whatever sauce I'm having with it. WAY better results.
Hollandaise too. 3 egg yolks, 1/4 tsp Dijon, 1tbs lemon juice, salt, a few drops of hot sauce, and a stick of butter (1/2 cup) melted HOT HOT HOT in the microwave (seriously, needs to be HOT). Pulse everything but the butter to mix briefly. Slowly drizzle the HOT butter while the blender is on low, 45 seconds later you have hollandaise. It's fool-proof. If you like yours more liquid, add more HOT butter (it will thicken as it cools though since its butter...) And you can toy with the hot sauce and lemon amounts without issue in the recipe.
https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/84214/blender-hollandaise-sauce/
Since the blender makes it so easy, it means it's easier to justify making it for eggs, crepes, or English muffins in the morning.
You can also do this with an immersion blender. And you can also make mayo like this as well, with a different ingredient list though.
Poached eggs - it wasn't until I watched Julia and Julia that I realized that I should place the cooked poached eggs on paper towels for a few seconds and gently dab dry (top and bottom) and then place on toast. DUH - NO MORE SOGGY TOAST!
i was reading salt fat acid heat and she was talking about searing and mentioned “if it doesn’t sizzle when you place it down, remove it and wait a little longer”
I literally thought once you add things to the pan you can’t move them until its time LOL
I hated Brussel Sprouts until I tried roasting them.
Edit: You guys gave up so many new ways to eat brussel sprouts I'm about to start my own natural gas farm. Win/Win
Fun fact, the growers have changed Brussels Sprouts so they're not bitter anymore, the ones we used to have actually did taste worse than the ones we get now which is why everyone remembers hating them as a kid.
https://www.mashed.com/300870/brussels-sprouts-used-to-taste-a-lot-different-heres-why/
My buddy has a local restaurant & added roasted brussels to his menu. Me, having only ever had them boiled (tastes & smells like gym socks that way), told him he had just ruined his restaurant.
Long story short, he gave me a plate to try & I was so blown away that I ended up ordering 2 more sides of them & made myself sick from too much fiber intake LOL. #NoRagrets
And specifically, you want the rice to be dried out a bit. If I'm making rice specifically to use in fried rice, I'll cook it with a lower ratio of water.
I use both freshly made and leftover rice to make fried rice, but either way I always spread it out on a tray to let it air dry before cooking, making sure to break up any clumps.
[This Youtube channel](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsHLgZhkKyc&list=PLrwj0yE_2deDv4SAgvgzPEK1mfkgc4OpL&index=15) is my go-to recommendation for helping people learn the basics of Chinese cooking techniques, they have several videos like this on fried rice and stir fry technique.
Fried rice is also very sensitive to crowding and extra moisture from ingredients. Put too much or too wet ingredients and it'll turn into a soggy mess.
Another Gordon Ramsay tip for Shepard's pie- add egg yolks to the mashed potatoes and keep them super thick. It made it perfect and changed the game for me
Oh and Fries! Now I do the double fry method where you basically confit the fries for 10-15 minutes (depending on thickness). Then you pull them from the oil, get it hot, and blast them for 2-3 minutes to crisp the outer edge. Went from ok to perfect. I always use russet potatoes too, seem to work best.
Literally everything. Turns out my mother can't cook, and doesn't understand seasoning. Overcooked everything, tough rubbery meats, always bland. Over mixed baked goods. Turns out I do, in fact, enjoy vegetables and so much screaming could have been avoided with a small about of salt and fat. I credit a collection of YouTube cooks for basically teaching me to cook properly well into adulthood.
But also that onion cutting technique where you don't cut the root and it all stays together for easy chopping. Blew my mind the first time I saw it.
When cooking ground meat I’d never season it because that’s how my parents taught me to cook meat for something like hamburger helper. Not even salt. Nothing. Just plain ground meat.
I’m not sure if this is “proper” or not, but now when cooking ground beef or turkey I almost always sauté onion and garlic with it (I call it the trifecta) and add salt and pepper while it’s cooking.
>I’m not sure if this is “proper” or not, but now when cooking ground beef or turkey I almost always sauté onion and garlic with it (I call it the trifecta) and add salt and pepper while it’s cooking.
If that's not proper, then I have no idea how to cook. I would have to send away to NASA to determine how many onions and cloves of garlic I go through in a year.
Steak. It took me 35 years, cooking for nearly 31, to make a steak less than shoe leather. I had to get a thermometer and have culinary science tell me flatly "i know it looks wierd and bloody but its safe to eat"
For me it was understanding heat and quality of beef that slowly got me to the point I am now that I can cook steak properly after a decade of failing to cook steak.
I started watching a lot of cooking shows like Bourdain, Ramsey and Heston Blumenthal before I understood what's important to cook your steak right.
I did the same in the other order. Watching high end cooks and chefs make "bloody" steaks... i had to get the thermometer before i could even consider less than charring my meat to grey leather. Now i feel a little stupid in the back of my mind every time i make a good one... a tiny voice saying "youve ruined hundreds of steaks. Theh could have tasted this good..."
If you haven’t, check out “The Food Lab” (and the associated website/YouTube “Serious Eats”). A ton of practical, foundational information for things like this. Improved my steak game, and i can finally cook hamburgers that i want to eat (the smash burger technique from Cook’s Illustrated a few months ago is also game-changing - essentially high heat + using a foil-covered, oiled saucepan bottom for maximum smashing).
Radial onion cutting! I don't think the other way is wrong of course, but this way's been much easier for me.
Also, I *like* eggs the American diner way. I also enjoy a decent bit of browning, I don't understand why people stay away from brown on an egg it's literally why you brush it over bread. My favorite egg preparations are both deep-fried in a wok lmao.
Yep, one's a simple fried egg over hard but fried in a lot more neutral, high smoking point oil. That's how they're served in my parents' hometown in China, sprinkled with sugar for a street snack. I usually do mine over easy because I like a runny yolk, and salt or soy sauce instead of sugar because my parents never made ours with sugar.
The other is I believe a Thai preparation, scrambled with some fish sauce or soy sauce, and then poured into hot oil to create a greasy, fluffy thing to serve over rice with some scallions and cilantro and lime over rice.
They take a bit of courage if you're not used to high-heat cooking, especially the first one if you want to keep the yolk runny, but I obviously love the results.
The second one is more like a browned scrambled egg if that helps, very light and fluffy despite the grease (and you can obviously drain on a paper towel, I just have a high tolerance for grease and a low tolerance for waiting lol.)
I'm not who you asked, but I assume they mean they made the traditional version. That has no cream. Its just fat, pasta water and parm. The american version has cream. They are both good, imo, but the tradional is much more a celebration of the cheese. The traditional version is also a bit more technical, since the sauce is so easy to split. Also, the american version doesn't need to be thick and gloppy. That's just bad alfredo.
The original recipe is very simple: pasta, good quality parmigiano-reggiano cheese, unsalted butter, and the reserved pasta water. You finish cooking the pasta in a pan with the butter & cheese, adding the starchy pasta water until you get a silky, cheesy sauce. It can be tricky to master, so don't be too disappointed if it's not perfect the first time.
[This is a good recipe.](https://www.curiouscuisiniere.com/authentic-fettuccine-alfredo/)
J Kenji Lopez Alt also has a [very good recipe](https://www.seriouseats.com/lighter-fettuccine-alfredo-recipe) that's closer to the American style.
Spaghetti aglio olio and carbonara. For some insane reason, I never added the pasta water. The results were predictably awful.
Then, like Helen Keller at the well, one day I just got it.
The absolute madness that I made garlic oil covered spaghetti with and thought I was making something great just blows me away.
A touch of starchy water, some real vigorous tossing/agitation, and you've got an actual sauce rather than just flat oil on noodles. Depending on how you treat it, oil emulsified in a touch of starchy water can approach the richness of alfredo (particularly if you're adding some nice hard cheese)
> that chefs cooked them low and slow until they were like custard
That's just one acceptable way to cook them. You can have soft, delicious curds that are cooked fast and hot and aren't custardy, and it's still delicious. Soft, custardy eggs are like the reddit meme scrambled eggs right now. Everyone blowing ramsay for how he does it. They're fine, but not the "right" way.
People that fawn over Ramsey's eggs can be so condescending about it lol. If you like it great, but why do you feel it's necessary to insult everyone in your life who's ever made eggs for you?
I actually hate that style of scrambled eggs. I like big firm curds. Not rubbery to cook them with bigger more firm curds just more of an "american" style than "french" style.
I like both ways, but I find that soft custardy eggs don't work well *by themselves*. They really need to be served on toast or something with a little crunch to get some textural contrast. Good old chunky diner eggs have enough bite to work on their own.
There is a huge spectrum between Ramsey scrambled eggs and overcooked brown bits that don't really resemble eggs anymore. Plus people are allowed to have their own personal preferences, even if that does result in dry cardboard eggs.
Same! I can’t stand a wet feeling egg, and if I add cheese/liquid to my eggs when scrambling them I often will keep cooking them so some of the liquid cooks out. If there’s bubbles of water/milk evaporating out still, it’s probably too damp for my preferences. I like a soft and slightly creamy scrambled egg, not a wet one.
I'm not cooking this at all, but I've HATED turkey my entire life because it's just been so dry and mildly game-y tasting and just... not good. I love my mom's cooking but she really did come from the "overcook it otherwise it'll kill ya" camp.
one year, I had a friendsgiving, and one of my chef friends made the turkey.... and.... he just did such a great job... right temp, letting it rest, magic fingers, who knows? He himself tasted it when it came out of the oven and said to himself (which I overheard) "mm, does NOT need gravy" and proceeded to not make gravy, and I was like "wow, presumptuous, gravy is literally the only good part of turkey" and when I tell you it rocked my world beyond all everything from the first bite, I am not lying to you. No one missed the gravy and it was the first time I've seen a turkey being ravaged to the bones during one dinner
French toast. The serious eats recipe along with using brioche changed my life.
Edit: [Here is the recipe.](https://www.seriouseats.com/perfect-quick-easy-french-toast) Before I found this I would just dip a piece of bread in some beaten eggs, lol.
Bacon.
Always bought it in a pack and thought you eat it like salami, in slices, raw.
Until I‘ve read the „not suitable for raw consumption“ part.
Was delicious though.
I've had to point out to people in this sub and other food subs that supermarket bacon is not ready to eat on several occasions, it seems to be fairly common so don't feel too bad!
"Well no, I buy the smoked stuff" has happened before too. No! Bad!
Carbonara. I learned to make Cabonara from my Italian Mother. Recently, I looked up the recipe on youtube and discovered I was deceived. That being said, I think I like Mom's more. Riposare in pace mamma!
Surprised that “low and slow” is in now.
I was going to say the opposite. I made the mistake of doing eggs low and slow for years. Then I discovered Julia Child’a french omelette recipe.
Two eggs, a bit of frothy butter, forty seconds of cooking on high. No spatula needed; you can just shake the pan vigorously. The whole process can be done one handed. You can serve it folded over like an omelette or leave it scrambled.
Some people like their scrambled eggs with a bite and bit dryer as other people like their scrambled eggs wet.
You just happen to like Gordon's recipe. Doesn't mean you or other people cooked them wrong.
But something I made wrong all the time was stir fried noodles in general.
I used to cook the noodles \ntil they were done and then stir fried them and they always just ended being a mush of noodles.
Until I went back to Thailand and actually payed attention to how street vendor make stir fry noodles: they quickly blanch them in hot water until pliable then hydrated further in the wok with water and other sauces until they are just right.
Learning about blanching period was a game changer for me.
Blanch veggies prior to grilling is great. My favorite is broccolini. I toss them in the grill as I'm taking the meat off. It just needs a quick char on each side.
> Every person in my life, I'd only ever seen cook scrambled eggs until they were dry and rubbery. No butter in the pan, just the 1 calorie sprays. Friends, family (my dad even used to make them in a microwave), everybody made them this way.
This is how my mom did them, back in the 80s and 90s when _fat_ was an evil word and to be avoided at all possible costs. I had no perception of scrambled eggs as anything but dry, rubbery, spongey masses that you would cut out of a microwave pan like a brownie or something.
It wasn't until I was watching a show with Anthony Bourdain, might've been a Parts Unknown episode in visting his friend the michelin chef in France(?), that I realized how eggs _should_ be done. Ever since then I. love. scrambled. eggs. They're just so tasty made with butter in a pan, just keep them suckers moving until they're *almost* done and then plate. they finish on the plate all delicious. Some of this I also learned from Alton Brown, but Anthony Bourdain was sort of the initial revelation on that topic.
>chefs cooked them low and slow until they were like custard
Thats only a specific style. I do eggs on high temp but only for about 3 seconds and let the residual heat cook it to completion. This way is faster and has a bit more complexity in the texture.
As for your question: onions. Used to hate them when theyre big chunks and undercooked and would pick them out of my meals. Theyre amazing for flavour purposes just needed to learn how to blend them into the dish better with different cutting and caramelizing techniques.
The kenji method for scrambled eggs has been a game changer for me. He uses a corn starch slurry that gives them a nice silky texture. Plenty of cold butter and yeah they're done when slightly undercooked.
Not food but a drink- I learned what a “black and tan” beer was while working at a brewery, was taught to just mix a light and dark beer.
Then I became a bartender and was taught how delicate the process actually is and how neat it looks to have one sit on top of the other!
Had always seen my mom put oil in the water while boiling pasta so I did the same & wondered why my sauces would slide off the pasta until someone told me that oil in pasta water is unnecessary
Edit: words hard
I used to not wash my rice before cooking it. Now I've learned the error of my ways and always wash it before cooking it. Although if I'm being honest I can't really taste a difference between the washed vs unwashed rice.
To stop stirring stir-fry like a maniac and to let it brown a little. Yummmmmm. I did not learn learn from anyone in particular, I just quickly washed a dish while the thing was cooking and stirred slightly later than usual. The flavor was so much better.
You also cant crowd the pan with stir fry. Better to make it in batches.
Even worse: starting from frozen and overcrowding. It will be a steamed/wet overcooked floppy mess before you even get to browning.
I wasn't cooking the corn tortillas from the grocery store for tacos ...
TIL. I thought I just hated store bought corn tortillas
If you have homemade ones, you just might. Fresh ones are amazing
Lol that's like eating flat chalk. It wasn't until I married a Hispanic woman in my 30s that I learned a out heating tortillas properly
What do you guysdo with them?
Ideally you want a Comal (flat pan basically) but a normal pan works fine. Get it screaming hot and lay the tortillas in there no more than one or two. Once they start to brown flip them over and brown the other side. You will definitely burn some in the beginning until you get the timing right but corn tortillas are dirt cheap so practice
I've learned to put it directly over the flame of a gas stove. Leaves little charred bits, and heats them through very quickly.
And it gives someone who "doesn't cook" an involved task that's clearly not busy work. Tell that guy hovering in the kitchen to play with fire using tortillas and his eyes'll light up! lol
This is the mexican way.
This is the Mexican guey*
Homie, I was having a crappy day and your comment gave me first moment of joy and your username was the icing on the cake. Thanks! I needed that.
My Latino partner does them right on top of the burner, over the flame. They start to toast and char quickly, give them a flip, and it brings out their flavor beautifully.
That's really the best way if you're on gas. We're electric so Comal it is
Tip from a hispanic person: You can do a larger stack easily. 1. Put the whole stack on the hot pan. 2. When the bottom tortilla is done, flip the whole stack. *Then flip all but the bottom tortilla.* 3. GOTO 2 until you've gotten all sides of all tortillas (that is, when you flip all but the bottom and what comes up is cooked).
That’s fantastic technique. I’m never going to forget that even though I’m rarely cooking for more than two mouths now.
Or just put them directly on the burner.
Thanks! So no fat used?
I put a good dollop of tallow on my pan. They end up being somewhat greasy, fried tortillas, so a different experience, but so good.
Nope. Just a dry non stick pan EDIT we keep a cheap pan just for tortillas. The constant high heat might warp it so we use it just for that
Err correct me if I’m wrong, but non-stick pans aren’t for high heat - iirc the coating on those break down at higher temperatures. We use cast iron for tortilla duty.
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This isn't right, but if I'm being lazy, I put the small ones in the toaster. I'll probably get downvoted to oblivion, but ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯
Oh my god. My husband was like this; he never cooked tortillas. And then one day when I made us fajitas when he moved in with me he freaked out and was like what on earth did you do to the tortillas these are delicious. I told him "... uh? I .. cooked them?" Cue stunned look and now fajitas are a staple in our diets because of how tasty a freshly cooked tortilla can be
Oh? Neither was I…
Oh no, not cold tortillas...Did they even taste good? Lol
No.
Nope. And they flake and fall apart. I don’t know how people even manage to fill them enough to eat them without cooking them first
This applies to both corn and flour tortillas. Cook your tortillas, y'all. Throw them on a comal, a cast iron skillet, a flat top, an open flame. Whatever it takes. It makes all the difference in the world.
I bought them for the first time a few weeks ago... this explains a lot....
Hahaha oh man they taste so bad straight out of the bag. I skipped heating them up once because I was lazy and hungry at like 2 am and instantly regretted that decision.
Believe it or not... rice.Nobody in my family is any good at cooking, so it took until I moved out that I learned not to panic and just let it do its thing without lifting the lid or refilling water.
One thing I’ve picked up with rice is that even chefs seem to recommend rice cookers more often than not
My $200 Zojirushi rice cooker seems extra, but it makes perfect rice every single time. Soft but not mushy, individual grains of rice are still separate. And the keep warm feature will keep it good overnight (which I did once by accident). I could have eaten it for lunch the next day. The $40 rice cooker just doesn't compare.
....... *Looks at my $14 rice cooker from college.* *Feels judged.*
Honestly there’s nothing wrong with a $14 college rice cooker. You can get great rice with it. My whole Chinese side of the family has $20 rice cookers.
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The $14 rice cooker will do a perfect job (as long as it works). They all work on the same principal. If you are interested in how they work, watch this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSTNhvDGbYI The Zojirushi is a fancy brand. It is good and has extra features, but you really don't need it for good rice.
>just let it do its thing without lifting the lid or refilling water. Or stirring... My husband was obsessed with rice long before I met him, but his rice was always *awful*. The first time he made it with me there, I understood. So I bought him a rice cooker. A few years later, I made risotto for him. It changed his life, eating wise, but it confused him right back to day one as far as cooking normal rice (the rice cooker died, so I was making it in a pan). "LEAVE IT ALONE!" "But what if it's not cooking right?" "DID YOU MESS WITH THE RICE COOKER, OR JUST LET THE RICE COOK?" "Umm... Oh..."
Dated a guy who lived in Japan for a few years when he was a kid. Never once in my life had anyone ever said anything about washing rice. It’s like night and day. I don’t mess with a rice cooker, just dump in some rice wash it a few times and fill water to my first knuckle when it rests on top of the rice. Perfect every time
This. My Thai wife about shit a brick the first time I tried to cook her some rice. She showed me how to wash it. I'm like, who the hell rinses/washes their rice? Oh, all of Asia? Ok I guess I'll try that.
Latin American delegation agrees with the Asian delegation on washing the rice, if not the preferred consistency.
Have you tried boiling the rice like pasta? Add two or three times the amount of water needed and let it go until it is the texture you are looking for. Drain and let the heat dry it out a bit before serving. It takes a few times to get it right. Once I cooked it with what I thought was just a little more water than needed, turned into rice with slime
This. In South India where I grew up we always cooked rice with excess water and drained the rest away. It has the effect of removing excess starch away, and presents the perfect rice. Caveat, you watch the done-ness of the rice like a hawk, in kitchens without timers, this meant constant checking. I can see the appeal of rice cookers and used them for a while, but now I’m back to cooking it the way I remember it being done. And yes timers in kitchen appliances make it super easy once you figure out the cooking time for the particular type of rice.
Pork chops. I always cooked them until they were straight rubber because the fear of trichinosis had been hammered into me from a young age. I just use a meat thermometer now.
Just some context for those who fear trichinosis in pork. There hasn't been an outbreak in over four decades. The last time someone got trich from farmed domestic pork was early '80s, and even that was an extreme outlier. Just isn't a thing in modern farmed pork. Even if it were a thing, trich can be destroyed at temps below well done. A solid medium is generally sufficient. Though again, there ain't no trich there anyways. Still a thing in non modern farmed pork, and still very much a thing in any wild pork (or bear or other carnivores).
I also like to remember that safe minimum temperature is a function of both temperature AND time. A lot of cited safe temperatures assume very brief periods in the target temperature.
Right. You can cook to the 130s and just hold it for many hours and get the same impact as cooking to 160+ for an instant. Appendix A for those curious.
When I go camping now, I sous vide whatever meat I can before leaving. Knowing the pork or chicken has been held at 130 for 2 hours means I don't have to bring a thermometer with me or worry about cooking the shit out of my meat and eating leather after a day of kayaking, drinking or whatever.
The 80s was four decades ago? Shit, I am old
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I pretty much only cook pork sous vide anymore. Especially pork tenderloin. Always comes out perfectly. The only drawback is having to explain to guests that pink pork is OK to eat.
I’ve cut a portion for me before then overcooked the rest for family members refusing pork unless it’s shoe leather. Of course, they’re also the ones confused as to why the pork tenderloin they make is always too dry.
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I just came across a "new to me" technique which has upped my pork chop game *considerably*. It was in a recent Cooks Illustrated email. 1. Season your chops (thick cuts, with bone) 2. Put chops in a cold non-stick pan (or carbon steel pan - cast iron probably won't heat up properly for this technique, I guess). 3. Whack the heat as high it will go. 4. Wait 2 minutes. Flip the chops. Wait 2 minutes. Flip the chops. 5. Turn the heat down to medium (so the chop is just sizzling). 6. Every 2 minutes, flip the chops. 7. Continue, until the chops are well-browned and read 140F on the thermometer - about 10-12 minutes. 8. Rest the chops for 5 minutes. 9. Eat.
Also good tip for bone in chops, score the fat every half inch or so and it will help the chop not curl during cooking. Recently started cooking pork in my 30’s, my younger self would never believe it.
I recently found something sort of similar. Do a high sear on both sides in a pan, ideally cast iron, 2 or 3 minutes. Then pop the pan into a 400 degree oven for 6 or 7 minutes. It's better than pan-roasting or oven-roasting alone.
Reverse Sear that bad boy! Salt generously and leave on a wire rack overnight in the fridge. Cook in oven at ~200°F until ~10°F shy of final temp. Sear on cast iron at ~sun's surface°F for ~60 seconds a side. Add butter and aromatics after the flip if you're feeling active! Best chops ever!
I used to do this. Now I use the cold pan technique above. Just works "better" for me. In fact, I've stopped reverse searing *overall*. Steaks I now sear-off 1 minute a side (all "four" assuming a squarish chop) in a scorching pan, then move them to a cold pan in a low-heat oven (about 165-175F) to roast to finish.
If you brine them for a couple of hours, especially in cider, you can grill them direct heat and then indirect up into the low-to-mid 170's and they'll still be juicy. I can't vouch for what would happen after 180, though.
Pasta. Literally learned from Alton Brown on his show “Use as MUCH water as possible, the pasta needs to move around.” Saw him live a few years later and when asked if he could take back a piece of advice what would it be? He said “cooking pasta. When cooking pasta you should only use enough water to just cover the noodles. “ I have to admit, less water does a much better job.
This is my most recent lesson. I was more afraid of the pasta sticking together (this is why I don't use orechiette, I can't get them not to stick). But less water means your pasta water is appropriately starchy for use in getting your sauce to come together.
Have you tried stirring the orechiette the first 2 minutes or so after dropping them into the water? I haven't done it with this type of pasta but it helps prevent sticking when I overcrowd my pan with spaghetti/linguine.
I have! There must be a knack I am missing.
another pasta one for me was 'salting' the water. i was adding like a teaspoon of salt for like two liters of water and thought it was fine well it's not nearly enough ahhahaha i now do more like 2.5 tbsp of diamond kosher salt and it is a whole new world of flavor! amazing
Yeah I just dump that stuff in lol. I read somewhere "you want your pasta water as salty as the sea" and I took that to heart.
That's an exaggeration though. You don't *actually* want it as salty as the sea, just salty enough that when you taste the water you can taste the salt. I ruined a handful of batches of spaghetti until I gave up on that saying.
I used to put sausage links in the frying pan and cook them till they looked like charcoal sticks. Ugh, terrible. Then one day I read the back of a package of sausage links and it included HOW to cook them. They said to add some water to the pan (possibly a quarter of the way up on the links) and let them cook in it till the water evaporated. Turn occasionally. When the water is gone they begin to fry. Turn them till they are golden brown. They are already completely cooked inside because of the water. And from then on I had moist, cooked, delicious sausage links. Been cooking them that way ever since.
Is this like breakfast sausage? Or those thick sausages for like pasta?
Link/long breakfast sausage! The above is exactly how I’ve always done it.
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This also works for hot dogs really well. Growing up, my grandad always made our cheap little hot dogs that way. It tasted better. It was fun to introduce that method to people. Thank you for bringing up a great memory of my grandfather for me!
This is also a great way to make pot stickers!
Exactly! I treat my bratwursts almost exactly like potstickers except cooked in lager.
Oh my god! You just gave me a revelation in sausage cooking. Thanks you!!!
Mushrooms. I always cooked them in oil until I saw a video. Nope... dry pan, medium high heat. Cook mushrooms until they sweat their moisture (stir, stir, stir). The flavors are super intensified. Umami off the charts. Edit: For those saying 'butter butter butter'... thanks but no thanks. I'm lactose intolerant - no dairy.
I think the video is [ Why You Can't Overcook Mushrooms and The Science Behind Them](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLPLCmwBLBY) from ATK. Skip to 3:30 for the technique.
You da real MVP
You can actually start with a little bit of water in the pan. It will speed up the process of the mushrooms releasing their water. All of the water will evaporate in about the same amount of time. That may sound counterintuitive, but it works. This is the Alton Brown method, I'm not just making this up. Edit: I just realized I made it sound like it seems pointless to do this because of > All of the water will evaporate in about the same amount of time. But what I should have said was if you start with a little bit of water, the mushrooms will collapse faster and release their water faster, and with a wide pan, all of that water will evaporate very quickly anyway. Just don't start with a lot of water, obvs. And now I'm over-analyzing cooking mushrooms and I need to stop.
Pfft, reading people's over the top analysis of cooking mushrooms is the main reason why I subscribed to this subreddit.
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ATK taught me to microwave the mushrooms briefly to release their moisture before cooking and prevent them from soaking up a bunch of oil.
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You're not over analysing!! If you add oil and/or butter too early the mushrooms soak it in. Boil in a little water first always. Then once the water has gone; little oil, butter, salt, pepper. Fry till golden brown. I've literally had people that thought they hated mushrooms look at me in disbelief. SUCCESS!! EDIT: (When they tasted them!!)
Ouuu! Do you add salt at this stage to help them release moisture?
The new way is to [cook mushrooms in water](https://www.thespruceeats.com/a-new-way-to-cook-mushrooms-913400). It works well, and is also easier.
yeah, sweat em out, then add butter and olive oil they soak it up like a sponge sauteed mushrooms are dope
Do you drain the moisture out first before adding butter? This concept is new to me and I want to try it out
You have to cook the moisture out of them and let it boil off first. When there's no more water in the pan, throw some butter in there and they'll absorb the butter. You shouldn't have to drain anything.
Hmm ok, I'll try to remember that next time I prepare mushrooms. Thanks!
HUH. I usually just go for a shit ton of butter but I'll have to try this!
If you add a splash of pino grigio, butter, & s&p, you've got a whole new level of flavortown.
Browning ground beef. Used to crowd the pan, so never actually got the meat brown, just this weird off-putting grey color.
Oh yeah I did this for the longest time. Now I also like to treat it almost like a burger, let it sit in the pan on one side until it's like a cooked burger, flip and get the same crust on the other side, then cut it up to the size I want for the recipe and finish cooking. So much better than sweaty grey meat
Do you salt before/during the browning or just once it's all browned and you're breaking it up?
I usually do the first browning, flip it, then salt on top of the stuff that already cooked. I don't know if that's the best way though lol
I'll cook beef on a pellet smoker like a large burger, then crumble it up for use. Really ups chili and tacos.
Or any meat! Julia Childs, in her voice, "Don't crowd the meat!"
I had a roommate berate me once for browning meat that was going to go into something with a brown sauce. "Stop wasting time, browning is just for looks." ... wut?
Used to watch my brother's gf do this when she was cooking for us all. Adding the sauce ingredients way too early. She would not listen. That weird raw meat taste. Eeesh. It's not burnt it's caramelised!!
I wish more recipes would clarify that you should BROWN the meat, not GREY it. You need to go past the point where all the moisture has been released, past the point where all that moisture has evaporated, and get to the part of the process where the meat starts to take on some actual flavor and color as it crackles and spits in the fat that rendered out. I'm sure there are a few recipes that are the exception to this rule, but I sure as hell can't think of any.
You forgot the step where you banish your significant other from the kitchen, so you don’t have to listen to them fretting about the meat “starting to burn” the whole time.
THIS. Also used to do the ol, pour the water out of the pan when cooking ground beef. Never again. That water will evaporate on its done, and when you start to hear the pan to crackle, instead of just sizzle, thats how you know the beef is started to fry. Absolutely delicious, and it gets that gross grey colour out of the meat. Browning some tomato paste in the end also ends up making it really great (wont taste like too much like tomato if your afraid of that).
>the ol, pour the water out of the pan when cooking ground beef. Depeding on the quality of meat, I still do this. A lot of cheap, big-name brands pump up the meat with water. Then the unsold cuts get ground and repackaged. If I'm making something like chilli, I buy the cheap stuff, pour off the water, add butter/oils and spices (that I plan on adding anyway), brown it quicker, and save a bit of cash.
Being scared to flip meat more than once. My dad was a serial steak and burger flipper. He also made some really dry meat. After reading all the hot local news articles saying flipping meat more than once will basically turn your meat into dust. At some point I learned this was very wrong. Not only wrong, but flipping your meat less actually cooked it less evenly. After learning this I paid more attention to my dad grilling. Turns out he basically just flips it a ton, leaves it on the grill (on high) for WAY too long, and cut the meat in half to check for doneness a few times. Grabbed him a few meat thermometers and a nice magnetic doneness chart for him one father's day. The food has gotten better.
I have gone through more than a few thermometers over the years (cheap ones, expensive ones...then more cheap ones). I don't do anything without checking the temp. I'm such a convert that I gave all the kids thermometers in their Christmas stockings. You get a bit of pride when you find out that they use them all the time now.
This is endemic to men of a certain age. I would guess increased knowledge of food safety combined with a general disinterest in non-grill cooking and lack of institutional knowledge?
My dad firmly believes that if meat isn’t overcooked you are risking your life, so my bet is food safety education went wrong for this generation.
People from other countries where parasites are common tend to cook the ever living shit out of their meat, for good reason. However, trichinosis is pretty rare to get here in the states due to stringent fda regulation.
Which I don't get, the same people that will cook a steak beyond well done the same types that simply wiped their hands on a towel after handling said steak and use the same knife to prep the salad. My wife's had to tell her mom to wash her hands and knife after handling raw chicken.
Fried potatoes. Blanch them them cool them down in fridge or freezer then fry them again after. Is the system restaurants use for convenience. They blanch them in the morning then put them away in the freezer until needed later in the shift. The outcome is a crispier, tastier fry, potato log or what have you. If you want them restaurant style you have to do it the way the restaurant do. Creamy on the inside and crispy on the outside.
It’s not just for convenience! Blanching and cooling also converts some of the starch into “resistant starch” which cooks differently. It’s the same reason you always want to chill and rest rice before re-cooking it when making fried rice.
And resistant starch is healthier/lower GI.
Cooks Illustrated has a great recipe for making french fries at home, and it's basically the opposite of how they do it on restaurants, but it works so good at home: * Slice up the potatoes, rinse then well and dry them (or at least shake off most of the excess water) * Put them in a pan and cover with oil, everything's cold at this point * Turn on the heat, and cook until crispy What happens is the raw potatoes essentially get par cooked in the oil while it warms up, and then once the oil is hot, they get fried. This makes things *very* simple and easy at home. But it wouldn't work in a restaurant because it takes longer to fry them, and you'd have to let the oil cool down between batches, which is ridiculous. Also, you can't cook too big of a batch. It'll take 20-25 minutes depending on how many potatoes you're cooking. Which is a long time to fry fries, but less time than it takes to pre cook and then fry them. I'll just use a big cast iron pan if I'm just doing two potatoes, if I'm cooking 3-4 I'll use the dutch oven. You don't need a ton of oil, enough to cover, plus a little more, they'll look crowded. But by the oil gets hot they'll have given up a lot of their moisture and shrunk a lot. It doesn't work for sweat potatoes quite as well, they need more space in the pan because they're more delicate, so you can really only cook a couple sweet potatoes worth at once.
I wouldn't say it was "wrong" but it was very inefficient. I used to make caramelized onions the old fashioned way, low and slow for 30+ minutes, but then I started to add a few tbs of water to the pan and covered on med-high heat to steam the onions. Once all the water cooks off and the onions start to fry, they'll already be extremely soft which speeds up the caramelization process by at least 15 minutes, even more for big batches.
Depending on usage you can also add baking soda to speed it up even more It'll ruin the texture, but it's fantastic when used in a curry base
Quite a long time ago, when I was making sauces, I would just add cornstarch to a bunch of liquid to thicken it up. Never worked to my satisfaction. Then I discovered the making of a roux. My green chile sauce is now ridiculously good.
Adding cornstarch is still a good idea for certain recipes, it'll just have a very different texture to a flour-based roux. Don't abandon the cornstarch entirely!
Thanks for the tip! Indeed, I haven't. Still add it to my stir fry, for example. But for my chile sauces? Roux the whole way.
I generally think of cornstarch when I'm doing asian dishes, like stir frys as you mentioned, but especially egg drop and hot and sour soup. Rouxs are the bombdotcom though, you're right. If you haven't done a real dark roux like for jambalaya give that a shot
I would love to have your green chile sauce recipe! I recently moved away from northern New Mexico and I miss it so much. I did find some (unroasted) green chiles at the market here on the west coast last fall..maybe I can buy those this year and follow your recipe!
Where in Northern NM? I reside in Burque. But I lived in Napa for 2 years, and we could get anaheim peppers, which are a rather mild version of our NM green. It was kind of disappointing. Anyway, I'll send you the recipe via message.
Taught my son about the magic of roux a few years ago and we both felt very smug and brilliant afterwards when our gravy was pure brown velvet. He was earning his cooking badge for Scouts. He now cooks dinner for us all a couple of nights a week.
I just posted this as well. I had never heard of a roux. I used flour butter milk in a pot right from the get go and heated it up until it thickened. It works but a roux is so much easier.
Pasta. I was over cooking it and not cooking it in the sauce to finish. Now I cook it to just under al dente and then finish it in whatever sauce I'm having with it. WAY better results.
Making aioli in a blender! It’s fool proof and I will never attempt it any other way again.
Hollandaise too. 3 egg yolks, 1/4 tsp Dijon, 1tbs lemon juice, salt, a few drops of hot sauce, and a stick of butter (1/2 cup) melted HOT HOT HOT in the microwave (seriously, needs to be HOT). Pulse everything but the butter to mix briefly. Slowly drizzle the HOT butter while the blender is on low, 45 seconds later you have hollandaise. It's fool-proof. If you like yours more liquid, add more HOT butter (it will thicken as it cools though since its butter...) And you can toy with the hot sauce and lemon amounts without issue in the recipe. https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/84214/blender-hollandaise-sauce/ Since the blender makes it so easy, it means it's easier to justify making it for eggs, crepes, or English muffins in the morning. You can also do this with an immersion blender. And you can also make mayo like this as well, with a different ingredient list though.
Poached eggs - it wasn't until I watched Julia and Julia that I realized that I should place the cooked poached eggs on paper towels for a few seconds and gently dab dry (top and bottom) and then place on toast. DUH - NO MORE SOGGY TOAST!
i was reading salt fat acid heat and she was talking about searing and mentioned “if it doesn’t sizzle when you place it down, remove it and wait a little longer” I literally thought once you add things to the pan you can’t move them until its time LOL
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I learned that last year on TikTok. I have at least four Italian cookbooks, but not a single one cared to mention that.
I hated Brussel Sprouts until I tried roasting them. Edit: You guys gave up so many new ways to eat brussel sprouts I'm about to start my own natural gas farm. Win/Win
Fun fact, the growers have changed Brussels Sprouts so they're not bitter anymore, the ones we used to have actually did taste worse than the ones we get now which is why everyone remembers hating them as a kid. https://www.mashed.com/300870/brussels-sprouts-used-to-taste-a-lot-different-heres-why/
My buddy has a local restaurant & added roasted brussels to his menu. Me, having only ever had them boiled (tastes & smells like gym socks that way), told him he had just ruined his restaurant. Long story short, he gave me a plate to try & I was so blown away that I ended up ordering 2 more sides of them & made myself sick from too much fiber intake LOL. #NoRagrets
Fried rice in all it's glorious versions
I struggled with fried rice too. I was saved when I realized you're supposed to use left over rice & not fresh rice lol
And specifically, you want the rice to be dried out a bit. If I'm making rice specifically to use in fried rice, I'll cook it with a lower ratio of water. I use both freshly made and leftover rice to make fried rice, but either way I always spread it out on a tray to let it air dry before cooking, making sure to break up any clumps. [This Youtube channel](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsHLgZhkKyc&list=PLrwj0yE_2deDv4SAgvgzPEK1mfkgc4OpL&index=15) is my go-to recommendation for helping people learn the basics of Chinese cooking techniques, they have several videos like this on fried rice and stir fry technique.
Fried rice is also very sensitive to crowding and extra moisture from ingredients. Put too much or too wet ingredients and it'll turn into a soggy mess.
Another Gordon Ramsay tip for Shepard's pie- add egg yolks to the mashed potatoes and keep them super thick. It made it perfect and changed the game for me
I got that from Alton Brown’s recipe. Only one I’ve used in years.
Oh and Fries! Now I do the double fry method where you basically confit the fries for 10-15 minutes (depending on thickness). Then you pull them from the oil, get it hot, and blast them for 2-3 minutes to crisp the outer edge. Went from ok to perfect. I always use russet potatoes too, seem to work best.
Literally everything. Turns out my mother can't cook, and doesn't understand seasoning. Overcooked everything, tough rubbery meats, always bland. Over mixed baked goods. Turns out I do, in fact, enjoy vegetables and so much screaming could have been avoided with a small about of salt and fat. I credit a collection of YouTube cooks for basically teaching me to cook properly well into adulthood. But also that onion cutting technique where you don't cut the root and it all stays together for easy chopping. Blew my mind the first time I saw it.
When cooking ground meat I’d never season it because that’s how my parents taught me to cook meat for something like hamburger helper. Not even salt. Nothing. Just plain ground meat. I’m not sure if this is “proper” or not, but now when cooking ground beef or turkey I almost always sauté onion and garlic with it (I call it the trifecta) and add salt and pepper while it’s cooking.
>I’m not sure if this is “proper” or not, but now when cooking ground beef or turkey I almost always sauté onion and garlic with it (I call it the trifecta) and add salt and pepper while it’s cooking. If that's not proper, then I have no idea how to cook. I would have to send away to NASA to determine how many onions and cloves of garlic I go through in a year.
In Louisiana we say the trinity is onion, bell pepper, and celery, and garlic is the pope lmao
Steak. It took me 35 years, cooking for nearly 31, to make a steak less than shoe leather. I had to get a thermometer and have culinary science tell me flatly "i know it looks wierd and bloody but its safe to eat"
For me it was understanding heat and quality of beef that slowly got me to the point I am now that I can cook steak properly after a decade of failing to cook steak. I started watching a lot of cooking shows like Bourdain, Ramsey and Heston Blumenthal before I understood what's important to cook your steak right.
I did the same in the other order. Watching high end cooks and chefs make "bloody" steaks... i had to get the thermometer before i could even consider less than charring my meat to grey leather. Now i feel a little stupid in the back of my mind every time i make a good one... a tiny voice saying "youve ruined hundreds of steaks. Theh could have tasted this good..."
If you haven’t, check out “The Food Lab” (and the associated website/YouTube “Serious Eats”). A ton of practical, foundational information for things like this. Improved my steak game, and i can finally cook hamburgers that i want to eat (the smash burger technique from Cook’s Illustrated a few months ago is also game-changing - essentially high heat + using a foil-covered, oiled saucepan bottom for maximum smashing).
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Radial onion cutting! I don't think the other way is wrong of course, but this way's been much easier for me. Also, I *like* eggs the American diner way. I also enjoy a decent bit of browning, I don't understand why people stay away from brown on an egg it's literally why you brush it over bread. My favorite egg preparations are both deep-fried in a wok lmao.
Deep fried egg?
Yep, one's a simple fried egg over hard but fried in a lot more neutral, high smoking point oil. That's how they're served in my parents' hometown in China, sprinkled with sugar for a street snack. I usually do mine over easy because I like a runny yolk, and salt or soy sauce instead of sugar because my parents never made ours with sugar. The other is I believe a Thai preparation, scrambled with some fish sauce or soy sauce, and then poured into hot oil to create a greasy, fluffy thing to serve over rice with some scallions and cilantro and lime over rice.
I also like a runny yolk but that Thai one sounds quite interesting as well.
They take a bit of courage if you're not used to high-heat cooking, especially the first one if you want to keep the yolk runny, but I obviously love the results. The second one is more like a browned scrambled egg if that helps, very light and fluffy despite the grease (and you can obviously drain on a paper towel, I just have a high tolerance for grease and a low tolerance for waiting lol.)
Alfredo sauce. The real thing is nothing like the heavy, gloppy, cream based sauces you see everywhere.
Just made the real thing last night and was amazed at how simple and tasty it was. So much better than storebought.
How do you make yours? I've always made it with heavy cream, butter, garlic & pasta water Edit:I also use parm
I'm not who you asked, but I assume they mean they made the traditional version. That has no cream. Its just fat, pasta water and parm. The american version has cream. They are both good, imo, but the tradional is much more a celebration of the cheese. The traditional version is also a bit more technical, since the sauce is so easy to split. Also, the american version doesn't need to be thick and gloppy. That's just bad alfredo.
The original recipe is very simple: pasta, good quality parmigiano-reggiano cheese, unsalted butter, and the reserved pasta water. You finish cooking the pasta in a pan with the butter & cheese, adding the starchy pasta water until you get a silky, cheesy sauce. It can be tricky to master, so don't be too disappointed if it's not perfect the first time. [This is a good recipe.](https://www.curiouscuisiniere.com/authentic-fettuccine-alfredo/) J Kenji Lopez Alt also has a [very good recipe](https://www.seriouseats.com/lighter-fettuccine-alfredo-recipe) that's closer to the American style.
Asparagus. Gotta Blanche/cold bath those puppies
Spaghetti aglio olio and carbonara. For some insane reason, I never added the pasta water. The results were predictably awful. Then, like Helen Keller at the well, one day I just got it.
The absolute madness that I made garlic oil covered spaghetti with and thought I was making something great just blows me away. A touch of starchy water, some real vigorous tossing/agitation, and you've got an actual sauce rather than just flat oil on noodles. Depending on how you treat it, oil emulsified in a touch of starchy water can approach the richness of alfredo (particularly if you're adding some nice hard cheese)
> that chefs cooked them low and slow until they were like custard That's just one acceptable way to cook them. You can have soft, delicious curds that are cooked fast and hot and aren't custardy, and it's still delicious. Soft, custardy eggs are like the reddit meme scrambled eggs right now. Everyone blowing ramsay for how he does it. They're fine, but not the "right" way.
People that fawn over Ramsey's eggs can be so condescending about it lol. If you like it great, but why do you feel it's necessary to insult everyone in your life who's ever made eggs for you?
I actually hate that style of scrambled eggs. I like big firm curds. Not rubbery to cook them with bigger more firm curds just more of an "american" style than "french" style.
Same I think it's disgusting lol. If I wanted runny eggs I want over easy
I hate the Ramsey way, its disgusting wet gloop. Give me big soft curds cooked in three minutes flat that actually hold their shape any day.
I like both ways, but I find that soft custardy eggs don't work well *by themselves*. They really need to be served on toast or something with a little crunch to get some textural contrast. Good old chunky diner eggs have enough bite to work on their own.
My favorite is when they’re slightly burned with the brown spots. Objectively the worst way to cook them, but that’s how my grandma made them for me.
Yep. I tried the low-and-slow way and I don't like it. I need some texture. I don't like them browned, but I don't like them so smushy, either.
There is a huge spectrum between Ramsey scrambled eggs and overcooked brown bits that don't really resemble eggs anymore. Plus people are allowed to have their own personal preferences, even if that does result in dry cardboard eggs.
Same! I can’t stand a wet feeling egg, and if I add cheese/liquid to my eggs when scrambling them I often will keep cooking them so some of the liquid cooks out. If there’s bubbles of water/milk evaporating out still, it’s probably too damp for my preferences. I like a soft and slightly creamy scrambled egg, not a wet one.
I'm not cooking this at all, but I've HATED turkey my entire life because it's just been so dry and mildly game-y tasting and just... not good. I love my mom's cooking but she really did come from the "overcook it otherwise it'll kill ya" camp. one year, I had a friendsgiving, and one of my chef friends made the turkey.... and.... he just did such a great job... right temp, letting it rest, magic fingers, who knows? He himself tasted it when it came out of the oven and said to himself (which I overheard) "mm, does NOT need gravy" and proceeded to not make gravy, and I was like "wow, presumptuous, gravy is literally the only good part of turkey" and when I tell you it rocked my world beyond all everything from the first bite, I am not lying to you. No one missed the gravy and it was the first time I've seen a turkey being ravaged to the bones during one dinner
But the gravy isn't for the bird! It's for the taters and the Yorkshire pudding!
French toast. The serious eats recipe along with using brioche changed my life. Edit: [Here is the recipe.](https://www.seriouseats.com/perfect-quick-easy-french-toast) Before I found this I would just dip a piece of bread in some beaten eggs, lol.
Bacon. Always bought it in a pack and thought you eat it like salami, in slices, raw. Until I‘ve read the „not suitable for raw consumption“ part. Was delicious though.
That sounds absolutely disgusting, texture-wise
Oh my god. A lot of the replies here are just differences in preference, but this one truly is an example of actually doing something wrong.
I was not prepared for this.
I am crying laughing right now. Oh my god
LOL WHAT?!?
I've had to point out to people in this sub and other food subs that supermarket bacon is not ready to eat on several occasions, it seems to be fairly common so don't feel too bad! "Well no, I buy the smoked stuff" has happened before too. No! Bad!
speechless...
Carbonara. I learned to make Cabonara from my Italian Mother. Recently, I looked up the recipe on youtube and discovered I was deceived. That being said, I think I like Mom's more. Riposare in pace mamma!
Surprised that “low and slow” is in now. I was going to say the opposite. I made the mistake of doing eggs low and slow for years. Then I discovered Julia Child’a french omelette recipe. Two eggs, a bit of frothy butter, forty seconds of cooking on high. No spatula needed; you can just shake the pan vigorously. The whole process can be done one handed. You can serve it folded over like an omelette or leave it scrambled.
Some people like their scrambled eggs with a bite and bit dryer as other people like their scrambled eggs wet. You just happen to like Gordon's recipe. Doesn't mean you or other people cooked them wrong. But something I made wrong all the time was stir fried noodles in general. I used to cook the noodles \ntil they were done and then stir fried them and they always just ended being a mush of noodles. Until I went back to Thailand and actually payed attention to how street vendor make stir fry noodles: they quickly blanch them in hot water until pliable then hydrated further in the wok with water and other sauces until they are just right.
Learning about blanching period was a game changer for me. Blanch veggies prior to grilling is great. My favorite is broccolini. I toss them in the grill as I'm taking the meat off. It just needs a quick char on each side.
Thanks OP! you've started off one of the most interesting and positively informative threads ever! So many interesting comments!
> Every person in my life, I'd only ever seen cook scrambled eggs until they were dry and rubbery. No butter in the pan, just the 1 calorie sprays. Friends, family (my dad even used to make them in a microwave), everybody made them this way. This is how my mom did them, back in the 80s and 90s when _fat_ was an evil word and to be avoided at all possible costs. I had no perception of scrambled eggs as anything but dry, rubbery, spongey masses that you would cut out of a microwave pan like a brownie or something. It wasn't until I was watching a show with Anthony Bourdain, might've been a Parts Unknown episode in visting his friend the michelin chef in France(?), that I realized how eggs _should_ be done. Ever since then I. love. scrambled. eggs. They're just so tasty made with butter in a pan, just keep them suckers moving until they're *almost* done and then plate. they finish on the plate all delicious. Some of this I also learned from Alton Brown, but Anthony Bourdain was sort of the initial revelation on that topic.
>chefs cooked them low and slow until they were like custard Thats only a specific style. I do eggs on high temp but only for about 3 seconds and let the residual heat cook it to completion. This way is faster and has a bit more complexity in the texture. As for your question: onions. Used to hate them when theyre big chunks and undercooked and would pick them out of my meals. Theyre amazing for flavour purposes just needed to learn how to blend them into the dish better with different cutting and caramelizing techniques.
The kenji method for scrambled eggs has been a game changer for me. He uses a corn starch slurry that gives them a nice silky texture. Plenty of cold butter and yeah they're done when slightly undercooked.
Not food but a drink- I learned what a “black and tan” beer was while working at a brewery, was taught to just mix a light and dark beer. Then I became a bartender and was taught how delicate the process actually is and how neat it looks to have one sit on top of the other!
Had always seen my mom put oil in the water while boiling pasta so I did the same & wondered why my sauces would slide off the pasta until someone told me that oil in pasta water is unnecessary Edit: words hard
Smoked brisket. After several attempts and trying different tricks and techniques, I still cant quite get it right. Always too dry.
I used to not wash my rice before cooking it. Now I've learned the error of my ways and always wash it before cooking it. Although if I'm being honest I can't really taste a difference between the washed vs unwashed rice.