MSG is a great seasoning and I use it regularly.
Margarine is not a replacement for butter. I don’t even consider margarine to be food.
I never even HEARD that anyone’s reason for adding oil was to keep it from boiling over - that makes no sense since adding oil does NOT prevent boiling over at all. The only reason I heard was to keep the noodles from sticking together. I’ve also heard what JeffLichtman says that you should NOT add oil because the sauce won’t stick. But personally I have not noticed that the sauce doesn’t stick when oil is added.
Real mashed potatoes are not very hard to make. And I’m with everyone else who thinks the claim that instant tastes anywhere near as good is INSANE.
God, please tell me husband this! It takes so many dished & utensils just for him to make eggs for breakfast - the bowl and fork used to scramble the eggs before putting them in the skillet may NOT be washed off by hand and used to serve or eat the finished product, but must go through the full dishwasher cycle. The thought of eating cookie dough horrifies him. he fretted about leaving groceries in the car 3 days ago for an hour because of the eggs - here in DC where lately it is much colder than a refrigerator. And no, he has never had any kind of food poisoning in his life to justify it.
This sounds totally awesome!
Amen! Love spinach raw or cooked, hate overcooked corn on the cob.
That’s your opinion - people who do so think it’s EASIER to eat. IMO you can never break it small enough to eat it without mess, so I don’t even eat spaghetti - there are plenty of other pasta formats that can fit on a fork easily.
Amen again.
But for me the best post prize goes to…
Good thing I was not drinking anything when I read this, because it would have come right out my nose!
OK, I will add my own heresy: a microwave oven is not the device of the devil. Sure there are a lot of things that can not be cooked in a microwave, but a lot of things can, and taste just as good. In hot weather, it’s a godsend to be able to cook without heating up the whole kitchen with a stove or conventional oven.
It absolutely does. Oil alters the surface tension of the water and helps prevent starchy bubbles from piling up on themselves. I’d rather use a bigger pot, but there’s no denying that oil will serve that purpose if you want it to.
Totally agree. Unless I’m making Buffalo wings. I have no idea why, but this is the “exception that makes the rule”. But yeah, I think margarine is closer to plastic than it is to butter.
I know. But I was referring to the US, which is where I have experienced most of this paranoia.
I know why!In the case of buffalo wings (and similarly coated foods) the oil acts as a carrier for the seasoning and keeps it in place. Margarine is essentially oil that has been solidified and flavored, which works much better for coating the food and holding the seasonings than butter would in this instance.
That’s not the exact scientific explanation, of course, but it’s the best I can do at this hour (2:30 AM). And that is the gist of it…Margarine is almost always preferable to butter when the oil content is what is needed, and the oil is the reason why some recipes will fail if margarine is substituted for the butter that is called for.
Actually, Alton Brown showed that the amount of oil that goes anywhere but atop the water is insignificant.
Instant potatoes today are a lot better than they were twenty years ago. While I wouldn’t say they are as good as starting from whole potatoes, throw in some sour cream and/or some shredded cheese and you have something that is better on the prep-time versus quality scale.
As much respect as I have for Mr. Brown, I’ve suffered through my parents greasy spaghetti long enough to both doubt him and appreciate the proper starchy style that results from not adding oil.
I love brussel sprouts when prepared shredded, lightly steamed, and with olive oil and bacon pieces. I got it from Jacques Pepin:
For the former, the convention is “what fish should smell like”. It shouldn’t smell the way some people think it should. Some people think cooked brussels sprouts should have that sulfur smell like Satan’s own farts- they shouldn’t smell like that, either.
“You get what you pay for” is conventional wisdom in a lot of areas. It even applies to some foods. It doesn’t apply to fresh produce.
This must be regional, because around here, the tasteless fruit/veggies from the supermarket are WAY cheaper than the flavorful ones from the local fruit stand, co-op, and farmer’s markets. A head of green leaf lettuce, for example, is about $1.29-$1.49 at the grocery store and will make two giant salads with some left over. The same lettuce from the farmer’s market is about the same price, but usually so small that I need 2 or 3 of them to get the same volume. And the farmer’s market is cheap compared to the co-op and/or fruit stand.
Well, at least morton’s is high in protein! :::::da dump bump::::
Do produce prices in your supermarket not vary seasonally? They did everywhere I’ve lived and shopped for produce. And the produce was cheapest when it was in season and plentiful.
Very timely thread for me.
I recently am getting into cooking (very basic stuff that I’ve never bothered with before ) and wondered how much recipes are about a kind of mythology about what works and is necessary -
Looking at recipes for pasta earlier this week I couldn’t uunderstand why one should add oil to the water when cooking spaghetti as water & oil obvioulsly don’t mix thoiugh I can see the answers given above make some sense -the big question is what is necessary to get the desired result - and what has become a convention passed down that doesn’t actually make any difference.
It’s certainly not a healthier substitute for butter, as was once thought. Now we know that trans fats are worse for you than saturated fats.
Good Eats is a good show to watch if that aspect of cooking interests you.
Exactly. I used to use the microwave only for reheating and frozen dinners, but I’ve discovered they’re awesome for steamed veggies, too. There’s also a microwave roux technique that I really like and, surprisingly, bacon works very well and gets ultra crispy in the microwave (although it’s a bit messy, so I do it the traditional way, on a pan.)
Here’s an entire industry shown up as fraud and Granny was right all along: protein and veg is good for you, stuffing yourself with refined sugar and starch makes you fat. When did we ever get conned into believing otherwise?
Right around the time that big corporations realized they could make money by packaging up sugar & salt in boxes and selling it to us with a huge markup. That went right along with making us all decide that cooking was “hard” and “took a lot of time.”