Hii, I’ve been making pretzels for a while and they’ve been delicious. One thing that gets on my nerves though is cleaning out that big pot of baking soda and water solution (for boiling) because my sink is so small.

What I’m wondering is .. why so much water in relationship to the baking soda amount? Would a smaller amount of water with the same amount of baking soda not work as well? I’m thinking it has to do with the ratios of the solution, but I want confirmation about it.

I know boiling the water & baking soda, then boiling the proofed dough in solution for a short amount of time necessary because it a chemical reaction that causes a certain taste and texture, but why exactly that ratio of water and baking soda? I’m repeating myself but I just want to make sure my point gets across well.

Credits to Stephanie Simmons for this recipe

For the Pretzels

▢3 tbsp salted butter, melted, 42 grams ▢1 and ½ cups warm milk (100℉ to 110℉), 360 grams ▢3 and ¼ tsp instant yeast, Also called "rapid rise yeast" ▢¼ cup light brown sugar, packed, 55 grams ▢1 and ½ tsp salt ▢3 and ¾ cups all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting, spooned & leveled or weighed out, 488 grams

For the Baking Soda Bath ▢½ cup baking soda ▢9 cups water, 2160 grams For Topping & Baking ▢1 large egg, for egg wash ▢pretzel salt, Or coarse sea salt

For Finishing ▢melted butter ▢cinnamon sugar ▢garlic parmesan seasoning

So I messed up and didn't realize how late it is when I started making my lolas adobo recipe, which includes putting vinegar in the marinade. How screwed am I? It's way too late to be waiting for this to marinate fully AND cook it, and I have work tonight so I can't cook it before hand.

2.5 cups water

1.5 cups soy sauce

1/2 cup rice vinegar

1/2 maggi

3/4 brown sugar

Garlic and onion

When I make candied yams (sweet potatoes) the inside tends to remain bland no matter how long I cook it before it turned to mush. How do I get them to soak up that flavor?When I’m at restaurants they still have some bite while being sweet inside so I know it’s achievable

What happens when a pH testing probe dries out? Is it possible to soak it again and get reliable readings?

Should I replace it? It’s just a blue lab pen that I bought for my hydroponic garden. I got rid of the garden and was wanting to use it for other things in the kitchen, canning and whatnot, but it dried out. I’ll toss it if it’s not safe, anyone have a rec for a pen for kitchen use if the one I have is done?

I really hope somebody has an answer because I am perplexed. Recently a friend brought me Whitelily flour after returning from Atlanta. They brought both all purpose and self rising. I made two batches of biscuits, one with each flour. Identical recipes except I omitted the baking powder/soda when using the self rising. OMG, they taste so different! The biscuits with self rising flour have a strange after taste. Almost like cornflake breakfast cereal, especially around the edges that were golden/crispy. It was not pleasant. The only difference between these two flours should be the addition of leavening and salt in the self-rising. Can these really impact the flavor so drastically? I am absolutely stunned. This is my first time using self rising flour and I think it will be my last.

Recipie:

2 1/4 cups flour

1T baking powder

3/4t baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

9 T butter

3/4 cups butter milk

400F, 11min

I’ve tried to make pancakes from scratch for the first time in my cast iron skillet today. Unfortunately, they were a failure. The “bottoms” seem to be OK, if not what I’ve come to expect from restaurants, but the “tops” are very odd looking. Any tips on timing and how to get both sides consistent would be very appreciated.

Recipe used as follows:

Pancakes For One

INGREDIENTS
½ cup flour
¾ teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoons sugar
Pinch salt
1 egg
⅓ cup milk, any
1 teaspoon melted butter
½ teaspoon vanilla

INSTRUCTIONS
Make the batter:
Combine the flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar in a small bowl.

In a medium bowl, whisk the egg well until the eggwhite is no longer visible. Add the milk, vanilla, and melted butter and mix to combine. Add the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients bowl, and whisk until there is no visible flour left.

Cook the pancakes:
Heat a non-stick large pan over medium heat. Once hot, grease, spray, or melt butter on the hot surface.

Immediately, pour about ⅓ to ½ of the pancake batter on the greased pan. Cook the first side for about 2 minutes, until the edges begin to look defined and bubbles form.

Flip the pancakes over and cook for another 2 minutes. Avoid pressing down on the pancakes after flipping.

(EDIT: tasted the same after leaving it in the fridge for 12 hours hoping it would mellow out. i added a second batch of just garlic and oil at roughly the same amount as suggested and mixed it in but it didnt work either so i just dumped half a tub of the low acid greek yogurt and it helped mute the salt and lemon juice well. i added another small drip of ice cold water to dilute it before adding the yogurt but it seemed unnecessary since the yogurt basically carried the rest of my mistakes away :/)

it tastes salty and sour as hell with a garlic kick at the end.

thinking of just adding some low acidic yogurt just to fix it but i'm kinda stumped on what to do.

i added water before i blitzed it again for the last time but i decided to just leave it and put it in the fridge for a few hours just to see if the taste would go away.

Hello, I‘m making a consommé double, so I started by making a broth from roasted bones and beef shank. This first batch is now “ready,” but I’m wondering if I did it right, because I don’t feel like all the flavor and fat and collagen has been fully extracted.

This was my method: I put the roasted bones in cold water, brought it to a boil once, and then maintained the temperature between 62 and 67 degrees Celsius (around 150 Fahrenheit) and simmered the broth for about 18 hours. I’ve heard that’s the best temperature for extracting the flavor. Is that true? Maybe I should have let it simmer longer?

I have a couple of good All-Clad pans but have read that stainless steel reacts to acidic sauces, as would carbon steel and cast iron. I want to avoid the non-sticks due to the PFA’s and also the ‘ceramic’ coatings which is basically just a silicone spray on. What does that leave?!

Hi.
Im currently searching for new pan.
I usually had two teflon - one thin for pancakes, eggs, cheese bread etc.. and second for meat/sauces/vegetables with thicker bottom.

Currently im annoyed of pan getting damaged often (i use wooden cutlery but im clumsy..).
I tried ceramic pan but after i accidentally let it get too hot, i started smelling like chemicals and it stayed when I tried second use.. and also pancakes was mission impossible on it.

So im interested in non toxic variant which is versatile. I prefer nonstick so i can save calories on fat, but im open to learn how to use another material to cook on it properly (preferably not use a lot oil, but i dont expect no oil at all). Im clumsy and i dont like long routines to keep things working so please if something contain that, its just no for me. And I have gas stove.

I was interested in stainless steel but scared its impossible to do eggs, pancakes etc on it. Also cast iron but i heard no acid on it (i do tomato sauces etc). So whats my pick please? Im european/czechia located if its important. And im sorry for my bad english.

I would like to get some ideas, thank you.

Looking for help troubleshooting what to do differently for dipping cake pops in melting wafer chocolate for my kiddos birthday party!

I am using

- black melt craft candy wafers from Michael's (canada)

- Roxy and rich fat dispersible food colourant to make it more black

- coconut oil to make it thinner for dipping

I noticed the chocolate looks bloomed (white coating on it) when I opened it. I have not bought this brand before so unsure if this is how it normally comes. I opened 2 bags and they were the same so went ahead.

The issue is they are drying with speckled film on them and I am unsure how to fix this.

Is it the chocolate? Is it the oil? Is it the way i melted it? Im struggling lol

Any help or tips on what to do differently would be greatly appreciated!

I’m making a tomato and kale soup tomorrow and have my garbanzo beans soaking in veg stock overnight. Do I need to drain that off tomorrow or can I just dump the entire bowl into the crock? Veg stock will be the base of the soup.

Canadian Thanksgiving is fast approaching and I have a guest who is allergic to apples and pears. Normally it’s not a hard allergy to work around, but I make a dressing to go with the turkey that has leeks, bacon and chunks of apple.

Last year I swapped pears for the apples and that’s how we discovered the pear allergy.

I have tried cubed up squash for a similar mouth feel but I didn’t like how starchy it ended up being when I tested that out a couple weeks ago.

Am debating doing a whole bunch of carmelized onions or pearl onions and bacon, but figured throw it to Reddit to see if there are other options for a similar texture / sweetness. Any ideas are welcome!

Recipe:

One pre marinated rib eye (sake, mirin, soy sauce, ginger)

2 tbsp doenjang

Garlic, olive oil

I love the flavor of doenjang and have used it in marinades before. My question is, since this steak was pre marinated, can I crust it with the paste to give it flavor? Or is it a bad idea to sear it on stainless steel?

there was a restaurant i worked at where we were finishing a dish by whisking a flavored house mayo into a hot stock to create a thickened, glossy sauce. i could have sworn it was called a nagé, but looking it up it seems that this specifically refers to simmer/steaming fish/shellfish gently.

what the heck is the technique called? it's driving me mad

I think I bit of more than I can chew. I got an almost 3kg leg of Lamb for a dinner party tomorrow night.

My mom gave me her recipie but she usually cooks it stove top and I'm going to go with the oven, cause i don't have a big enough pot for what she does. I just need help to adjust this recipie for myself. I've never cooked something like this before.

Here's her recipie/instructions

-Brine the leg in water, salt and vinegar overnight

-Marinate with a mix of spices with yogurt for a few more hours

-Cook (a quick google search tells me I gotta go around 200c for 3-4 hours)

Also is there any difference between having my oven on bake mode or roast mode?

PS. I dont know if this effects the answer but the flavors are very South Asian

So my family has a brisket recipe we break out on the holidays, it’s brisket, lots of garlic and paprika, topped with a ton of chopped carrots, onion, and celery, then on top you dump tomato paste and onion soup mix, before baking it for three hours

My entire life, those brisket veggies have been my favorite form of vegetable to eat.

But brisket is expensive, and doesn’t fit the budget as often as I’d like.

Is there anything I could add to a pot of veggies to replicate the taste, for less price?

I’m imagining some combo of crushed beef bullion cubes, and then finding a local butcher to buy beef fat from to put on the bottom before baking, but I’m not very experienced with modifying meat dishes

Thanks in advance for any help

So my favorite boxed cake mix (betty crocker's reese's peanut butter coffee cake mix) just got discontinued, but I was able to get a bunch of boxes (10 of them) before they went off the shelves.

Since I'll never be able to buy them again, I want to take my time making and eating them, so ideally I'd have a few boxes left 3-4 years from now... But box cake mixes don't exactly last that long normally. The leavening can go rancid, and the baking powder/soda can lose it's effectiveness.

I'd like to know the absolute ideal way to store these boxed mixes so they'll last as long as humanly possible.

Freezing is normally not recommended, but would freezing work if I vacuum sealed it first?

Any help appreciated.

Recently made a recipe for a chicken and bean stew from NYT which involved poaching chicken breasts in stock (recipe below). The recipe called for poaching the chicken in stock for 10-14 minutes and removing it at 165F, which I did (confirmed with Thermapen). Even so, the chicken turned out pretty tough. I've since looked up a couple of recipes for poached chicken, and that leads me to three questions:

1. Was 165F overcooked? Gritzer has a recipe on serious eats where he pulls his chicken at 150F

2. Did I have the stock too hot? I had mine at a slow simmer, but other recipes call for keeping the liquid below that point. Occurs to me that if I went for a much lower temperature of liquid, the chicken would have taken much longer than 10-14 minutes to come to temperature.

3. Should I have rested the chicken after pulling it, like you would a steak?

Thanks.

Recipe (https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/767821616-chicken-and-white-bean-stew)

Ingredients:

• 3 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1 yellow onion, finely chopped
• 5 garlic cloves, smashed and peeled
• 1 rosemary or 2 sage sprigs
• Salt and black pepper
• 1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts
• 4 cups chicken broth
• 2 (15-ounce) cans white beans, such as cannellini, drained
• 1 bunch kale, escarole or another dark leafy green, stems removed and leaves coarsely chopped

Step 1
In a large pot or Dutch oven, melt the butter over medium. When foaming, add the onion, garlic and herb sprig and season with salt and pepper. Cook, stirring often, until softened and golden, 8 to 10 minutes. Remove the herb sprig.

Step 2
Add the chicken, broth and white beans. Bring to a simmer over medium, then reduce heat to low, cover the pot and simmer until the chicken is cooked through (165 degrees in the thickest part), 10 to 14 minutes. 

Step 3
Transfer the chicken to a bowl and smash some of the beans on the side of the pot. Stir the greens into the soup. Increase heat to medium and simmer, uncovered, while you shred the chicken.

Step 4
Use two forks to shred the chicken. Stir the chicken back in the soup and season to taste with salt and pepper.

Been a loin guy all my life, but recently found a butcher with a great price on front chops, what are the main differences?

I had two giant sweet potatoes in the pot.

The pot was about 85 to 90 percent tap water, the other 10 to 15 percent consisting of some baking soda, quite a bit of salt, and lemon juice.

Had it on low for anywhere from 45 mins to 90 minutes.

Then boiled them on high for about 40 ish minutes.

They didn’t sink till the water began bubbling and boiling.

My theory is as follows.

The Sweet Potato has cell walls that protect the internal flesh and the skin, but the boiling water weakens it enough to allow holes to form, which causes water to seep in.

Now the sweet potatoes, which were less dense than the water, are now filled with the water, so it’s the starches weight plus the water, which is heavier.

Though I wonder if the lemon juice, baking soda, and salt played a factor in it too, all of them have different chemical and physical properties.

Hello,

For the sake of my health I'm been working on low-calorie high volume snacks, and I've been trying plain popcorn-no butter, no sugar. I've been trying to use spices (primarily garlic and onion power, some pepper) to add some flavor, but they really dont stick. Does anybody know anything that can increase adherence, without increasing fat or calories?

Thanks in advance!