Category: Cooking Tips

(NAPSI)-From ingredients to decor to equipment, a growing number of American kitchens are taking on a Japanese flavor.

For example, many cooks now prefer using Japanese knives. Believing these knives offer superior cutting performance, some cooks assume that a knife that looks like it’s from Japan must also cut well. Unfortunately, this is not always the case.

The good news is that sophisticated consumers are learning to distinguish between the look-alikes that don’t really cut well and genuine knives that are popular with consumers in Japan.

That’s the concept behind a line of cutlery designed and produced in a factory in Japan that has a history of producing quality knives for years.

Called Miyabi, the knives have a modern, Japanese design, inspired by samurai swords and based on the traditional shapes of Japanese knives, but use modern and durable materials. Available in Japan and sold to consumers at leading department stores there, they are now available in the U.S.

To achieve the desired sharpness, traditionally, Japanese kitchen knives were made from the same type of steel that was used to make the katana. Commonly referred to in the West as a “samurai sword,” this type of blade, while very sharp, required frequent polishing and care to prevent rust and corrosion.

The new Miyabi knives feature a different steel in each of the four series. All the steels are manufactured keeping true to the traditional features of Japanese cutlery; that is, maintaining the true Japanese edge angles, blade shapes and blade thicknesses. The Miyabi knives are authentic Japanese cutlery at its finest and enable cooks to enjoy scalpellike sharpness in the home.

All Miyabi knives also feature the traditional “D”-shaped handle, which is thought by many to be the key to effortless fingertip control. The 7000 Series handle is made of a new material, Micarta, which forges layers of linen and resin under immense heat and pressure. It has the beauty and elegant look of wood but none of the issues of wood. The 5000S series is made of POM plastic with reinforced fiberglass.

The collection consists of double-bevel-edge knives, similar to Western knives, and also single-bevel-edge knives, which are traditional in Japan.

Now the leading upscale Japanese knives sold in Japan are available to American cooks.

Visit www.zwilling.com to learn more about this company, founded in Solingen, Germany in 1871. It is a global manufacturer, with products sold in more than 100 countries.

Many cooks prefer using Japanese knives because they believe these knives offer superior cutting performance. Shown is the 8″ Gyuto knife.

This posting is sponsored by the Family Cookbook Project which helps families and small groups create personalized cookbooks that are easy and affordable.

(NAPSI)-Here’s mouthwatering news: You can give family and friends decadent desserts with good-for-you nuts in them.

Macadamia nuts are a concentrated source of monounsaturated fat, which, when eaten regularly, may help displace sources of cholesterol-raising saturated fats in the diet.

In addition to their great taste, the nuts are cholesterol free and contain important nutrients including protein and fiber. They’re also a delicious way to get vitamins such as B6 and thiamine, and minerals including magnesium, copper, selenium, phosphorus and manganese. What’s more, research suggests that nuts contain naturally occurring plant compounds, or phytochemicals, which may have health benefits as well.

Here are two recipes you may care to try:

CHUNKY MACADAMIA BARS

¾ cup (1½ sticks) butter or margarine, softened

1 cup packed light brown sugar

½ cup granulated sugar

1 egg

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2⅓ cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1¾ cups (10-oz. pkg.) Hershey’s® Mini Kisses® Brand Milk Chocolates, divided

¾ cup coarsely chopped Mauna Loa® Macadamia Nuts

Vanilla glaze (recipe follows)

Heat oven to 375°F. Beat butter, brown sugar and granulated sugar in large bowl until fluffy. Add egg and vanilla; beat well. Add flour and baking soda; blend well. Stir in 1 cup baking pieces and nuts; press into ungreased 13x9x2-inch baking pan. Sprinkle with remaining ¾ cup chocolates. Bake 22 to 25 minutes or until golden brown. Cool completely in pan on wire rack. Drizzle vanilla glaze over top; allow to set. Cut into bars. About 24 bars.

Vanilla glaze: Combine 1 cup powdered sugar, 2 tablespoons milk and ½ teaspoon vanilla extract in small bowl; stir until smooth. About ⅓ cup glaze.

SUPREME CHOCOLATE SAUCEPAN BROWNIES

1 cup (2 sticks) butter or margarine

2 cups sugar

½ cup Hershey’s® Cocoa

4 eggs, beaten

⅔ cup all-purpose flour

½ teaspoon salt

¼ teaspoon baking soda

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

2 cups (12-oz. pkg.) Hershey’s® Special Dark® Chocolate Chips or Hershey’s® Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips

½ cup Mauna Loa® Macadamia Baking Pieces

Heat oven to 350°F. Grease 13x9x2-inch baking pan. Melt butter in medium saucepan over low heat. Add sugar and cocoa; stir to blend. Remove from heat. Stir in eggs. Stir together flour, salt and baking soda; stir into chocolate mixture. Stir in vanilla, chocolate chips and nuts. Spread in prepared pan. Bake 30 to 35 minutes or until brownies begin to pull away from sides of pan and begin to crack slightly; do not underbake. Cool completely in pan on wire rack. Cut into bars. About 24 brownies.

You can find more information and a variety of recipes online at www.hersheys.com.

Macadamia nuts are cholesterol free and contain important nutrients, including protein and fiber. Plus they make marvelous additions to desserts.

This posting is sponsored by the Family Cookbook Project which helps families and small groups create personalized cookbooks that are easy and affordable.

Here is an interesting post from Cookbook Contest Central that I though I would pass on.

The author says a chili cook-off is the perfect alternative to a formal Thanksgiving dinner or ideal for game day. To check out my ideas for hosting your own chili cook-off and the PlumpJack chefs’ tips for making the best chili, read more.

A chili cook-off would also be a great time to get everyone to contribute to a family cookbook.

(NAPSI)-When it comes to choosing a holiday wine, often, the trick is to select a wine that is both versatile and balanced; a wine that is neither overpowering in flavor nor too delicate. It needs to enhance a wide array of subtle flavors but not get lost in the fare. Fortunately, California’s Sonoma County has a number of delicious, well-balanced wines that demonstrate how the region’s diversity provides a variety of wines for holiday entertaining. Here are four to consider:

• Sonoma Vineyards Sauvignon Blanc is great for brunch with friends. According to Food & Wine magazine, it is one of the “great value wines” from Sonoma County. The tropical fruit and ruby grapefruit flavors pair wonderfully with breakfast fare and do not add heaviness to the meal.

• For a rich, mineral-flavored wine with vibrant acidity, you may want to try Rodney Strong Vineyards Chardonnay Reserve Russian River Valley. The grapes grown in Russian River Valley are known for award-winning chardonnays and tend to create wines with depth and complexity. Rated over 90 points by both Wine Spectator and Wine Enthusiast magazines, it complements a variety of fowl dishes and rich cheeses.

• When the weather is cooling, staying indoors and cooking hearty dishes can be a great way to spend time with friends and enjoy a bold cabernet sauvignon from Sonoma County’s Alexander Valley. Cabernet warms up any occasion, even if you’re bold enough to venture outside to grill a steak. Find a bottle of Rodney Strong Alexander Valley Cabernet and you’ll find a wine with aromas of blackberry and cocoa leading to a rich, textured feel.

• Finally, pinot noir is getting a lot of attention these days and there are few places that grow better pinot than Russian River Valley. You can look for Davis Bynum Pinot Noir for a food-friendly wine, full of bright fruit aromas and flavors. Pinot noir is one of the most versatile wines for food and this well-priced pinot can complement hearty pasta or even a holiday dinner.

This season, remember to take time out for all the smaller occasions, whether it’s brunch with friends or celebrating the fact that you left your work at the office for once–break out your favorite Sonoma County wine and pour yourself a glass. Every day should be this good. Cheers!

Many people are discovering the delightful versatility of Sonoma County wines this holiday season.

This posting is sponsored by the Family Cookbook Project which helps families and small groups create personalized cookbooks that are easy and affordable.

(NUI) – If you’re confused about the dates you see on egg cartons, it’s not surprising. Food product dating is hard to understand. One of the more puzzling facts is that none of the dates on food packages — not even “use by” dates — are an indication of food safety. Instead, package dates refer to product quality.

An “expiration” or “sell by” date on some egg cartons helps to ensure that the eggs are fresh by informing the grocery store not to sell the eggs after the marked date. These dates are also intended to encourage you to use the eggs when they’re still at their highest quality. An expiration date on the carton is not required but, if one is used, it can be no more than 30 days after the eggs were packed. Since the packer or retailer may choose a date under 30 days, your local retailer can give you more complete information about how many days a “sell by” or “expiration date” allows after packing.

Some cartons show a Julian date on the short side of the carton. The Julian date is the day the eggs were packed — starting with 001 as Jan 1 and ending with 365 for December 31. For example, eggs packed on June 15 would be marked 166. Some other egg packers print an open “use by” date — July 15, for example — right on the eggshell itself. If properly refrigerated, shell eggs will keep with insignificant quality loss for at least four to five weeks after the Julian or pack date. If there is no Julian or pack date, using your eggs within three weeks of purchase will allow for the possibility that your eggs may have been temporarily warehoused by the retailer before you bought them.

Why isn’t safety a factor in these dates? Food safety depends on many things, including how you handle and store eggs and other foods. Both quality and safety changes can happen before or after the date on a package. For example, if you put a fully-cooked deli ham and a carton of eggs in the trunk of your car on a hot day and then run several errands before you refrigerate the ham and eggs at home, you’ve both reduced the ham’s and eggs’ shelf-life and increased your risk of food-borne illness — no matter what the package dates say.

Even when eggs are refrigerated, time causes a quality difference, too, especially in appearance. As eggs age, the whites thin and the yolks flatten. This means that the eggs will spread more in a pan if you fry them and there will be more “angel wings” of white in the water if you poach them. Because the yolk membranes also weaken with age, the yolks may break whether you want them to or not.

For recipes where shape isn’t important, particularly when whites and yolks are beaten together, you can still use the eggs. The weakening of the yolk membrane, however, makes it easier for bacteria — if they’re present — to reach the nutritious yolk. So, to prevent the possibility of foodborne illness, it’s best to use older eggs in fully cooked items, such as quiches, stratas and baked goods.

When correctly handled, eggs have a fairly long shelf-life compared to other perishable foods. For both quality and safety, simply keep eggs refrigerated and cook them properly.

If you love to cook, consider creating your very own family cookbook at www.FamilyCookbookProject.com. We make it easy to turn a collection of recipes from family and friends into a beautiful family cookbook!

(NAPSI)-You may be able to indulge with a tad less guilt this holiday season. Use canola oil in recipes that call for oil or solid fat in baked goods such as breads, loaves and muffins, says Shirley Corriher, author of the new “BakeWise” cookbook and winner of the James Beard Award for Excellence. Canola oil has the least amount of saturated fat of any common cooking oil and is free of trans fat and cholesterol.

When substituting canola oil for other oils or melted solid fat, you will reduce the saturated fat content of baked goods. You will also reduce the total amount of fat by up to 25 percent and eliminate trans fat and cholesterol when using canola oil instead of butter or lard. Use the chart to convert your recipes.

“Canola oil not only makes baked goods healthier, it makes them moister and more tender,” Corriher says. “I use canola oil in almost all of my muffin and cake recipes.

“Oil makes cakes more tender by preventing gluten formation in the flour,” she explains. “Oil does this better than solid fats. I prefer canola oil because of its healthy fats, light texture and mild flavor.”

For a variety of holiday and anytime-of-year recipes, go to www.canolainfo.org. Each week in November and December, a new holiday recipe will be featured on this web site. To kick off the season, here’s a delicious holiday dessert that’s easy to make and likely to impress your guests.

So Light, So Easy Pumpkin Cake

18.25-oz. box white cake mix

11/4 cups water

¼ cup canola oil

1 large egg

2 large egg whites

1 cup canned pureed pumpkin

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

½ teaspoon ground nutmeg

½ teaspoon ground ginger

Canola oil cooking spray

Fat-free whipped topping

1. Preheat oven to 325° F.

2. Combine all ingredients, except oil spray and whipped topping, in large bowl. Using electric mixer, mix per directions on cake package. Coat 13×9-inch nonstick cake pan with cooking spray and spoon batter evenly into pan. Bake 25-35 minutes or until wooden pick inserted comes out clean. Place pan on wire rack and cool completely.

3. When serving, spoon 1 tablespoon of whipped topping on each slice. May freeze leftover cake up to one month.

Yield: 20 servings.

This posting is sponsored by the Family Cookbook Project which helps families and small groups create personalized cookbooks that are easy and affordable.

The Hartford Courant newspaper ran a very interesting article on January 17, 2008 by MELISSA A. TRAINER.

The article was very interesting and I thought I would offer the opening here, but you should read the entire article at the Courant website.

Here it is:

MyRecipes.Com:
There Are Pitfalls To Sharing Aunt Betty’s Secret Spaghetti Sauce With The Digital World

A recipe box jammed with handwritten treasures is about as quaint in this digital age as a pen-and-paper diary kept under lock and key.

Still, grandma’s recipe box never had a server problem. And she certainly didn’t risk having her favorite cookie recipe end up in someone else’s cookbook.

As food websites grow in popularity and sophistication, more home cooks are taking advantage of online features that allow them to create and share digital recipe boxes. Users and administrators of these sites — among the best known are Allrecipes.com, Epicurious.com and Recipezaar.com — say they offer easy, secure, space-saving ways to store family recipes.

Online Recipes Gather Compliments

But what happens when the site’s server crashes? What happens when you die and take your password with you? And what rights do you give up when you upload your family’s favorite recipes?

Here’s what you should know before you upload that recipe:

Click here to see the entire article.

I though this was very interesting because the Family Cookbook Project also allows contributors to mark a recipe private or public. The best think about Family Cookbook Project is that at the end of the project there is a printed and bound cookbook to use when you don’t want to go online.

Here is an article from the Food Network on how to buy, use and store the best chocolate products for your baking needs.

The percentages listed on a chocolate bar represent the amount of cocoa butter and cacao solids by weight. The rest is largely sugar. Depending on the quality of the bar, there might be other additives present, like vanillin or lecithin, but they generally total less than one percent. Milk chocolate must have a certain percentage (12% minimum) of either powdered or condensed milk added as well.

Chocolate comes in the following levels of sweetness, from least to most added sugar:

* Unsweetened chocolate (which is exactly what it sounds like; it’s also sometimes called baking chocolate).
* Dark
* Bittersweet
* Semisweet
* Milk Chocolate

White chocolate is made from cocoa butter, without any cocoa solids, so it’s technically not chocolate at all.

Cocoa, which is key to the distinctive chocolate taste in baked goods and candies, comes in two styles: Natural (non-alkalized), and Dutch-processed (alkalized). These should not be confused with the instant sweetened versions intended for hot chocolate.

Cocoa powders are primarily used for baking, but make top-notch hot drinks when mixed with sugar to balance their bitter taste. Natural cocoas, like Hershey’s or Ghirardelli, tend to be lighter in color than Dutch-processed varieties like Droste. Which is “better” on the taste front? Some bakers prefer the direct chocolate flavor of natural cocoa, while others vote for the mellowness of Dutch.

However, when using chemical leaveners (baking powder or soda), make sure to use the type of cocoa called for in the recipe. Natural cocoas are acidic enough to activate the baking soda in cakes and cookies; alkaline Dutch cocoas should be used in recipes that rely solely on baking powder for their lift.

Storing:
Keep chocolate wrapped well, in a cool, dry place (not the fridge). Milk chocolate keeps for up to a year; dark for even longer. If the chocolate develops white dots or streaks on the outside, that’s called “bloom.” It means the cocoa butter has become un-emulsified (separated), but it’s still perfectly safe to eat.

This posting is sponsored by the Creative Chocolate Printing Company which provides personalized chocolate gifts and chocolate party favors for any event, occasion and budget. Chocolography™ is a newly patented technology that makes it possible to reproduce any picture, image, or message right on the surface of delicious chocolate.

Chocolate, much like wine or cheese, can vary vastly from brand to brand, and even within brands. The quality of chocolate depends on the origin of cocoa beans, as well as how they are roasted, processed and blended. And, just like wine, there is no definitive right or wrong as far as taste goes; it is a personal preference. With the vast differences among types of chocolate, cocoa percentages and brands, it is helpful to taste chocolates before baking with them to find one whose flavor you enjoy.

The Food Network Web site has an interesting article on Learn how to taste and select chocolate like the pros.

Here are their findings:

Chocolate Varieties: Bittersweet & Semisweet: In general, we find that bittersweet and semisweet can be used interchangeably in recipes without altering the outcome. The flavors of each individual chocolate, however, can be quite different, so taste each one before baking with it. If the chocolate is flat and bland, a chocolate mousse made with it is likely to be bland as well.

Although bittersweet lends an intense chocolate flavor, it often lacks the roundness that works well in chocolate mousse or truffles. It’s a good choice for recipes such as bundt cake or soufflé, where the chocolate flavor needs to stand up to many other ingredients.

We find semisweet to often have rounder, fruitier qualities that work well in mousses, truffles and any recipe where the outcome depends heavily on the inherent flavor of the chocolate.

Chips & Chunks:Chocolate chips or chunks are best used only as add-ins to recipes; they shouldn’t be used for melting or in the place of chopped bittersweet or semisweet chocolate. These chocolates have a different level of cocoa butter content, as they’re designed to hold their shape when baked. As a result, they have a different texture in baked goods from melted baking chocolate.

Unsweetened:Unsweetened chocolate (chocolate in its rawest tasting form) is unpalatable and therefore hard to taste on its own. This is a case where the appearance (dull or shiny) and the aroma may be your best clues as to its quality, intensity and flavor. Unsweetened chocolate is almost always used in recipes like brownies, where the addition of granulated sugar contributes to the texture of the finished baked good.

Brands: The following baking chocolates fared well in our five tasting categories (appearance, aroma, break, melt, taste and aftertaste) and are ranked according to our preferences.
* Lindt Semisweet Chocolate – first choice
* Scharffenberger Semisweet – second choice
* Nestle’s Chocolatier [dark] – tied for third
* Baker’s Semisweet – tied for third

This posting is sponsored by the Creative Chocolate Printing Company which provides personalized chocolate gifts and chocolate party favors for any event, occasion and budget. Chocolography™ is a newly patented technology that makes it possible to reproduce any picture, image, or message right on the surface of delicious chocolate.

The Food Network Website has a great series of helpful tips for cooking with chocolate called Chocolate 101.

While the eight tips are wonderful, it’s the photos of chocolate thatwill get your mouth watering!

This posting is sponsored by the Creative Chocolate Printing Company which provides personalized chocolate gifts and chocolate party favors for any event, occasion and budget. Chocolography™ is a newly patented technology that makes it possible to reproduce any picture, image, or message right on the surface of delicious chocolate.