March 17, 2006
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Are there any Conventional Cooking Rules you break with impunity? You know, one to which every single cookbook, cooking article, cooking show, etc. sternly refer?
I've got one.
I wash my mushrooms. Stick 'em right under the faucet.
And for the life of me, I don't see the problem with doing this, but for years the CW has been.....whatever you do, do NOT wash mushrooms! Just wipe them off with a damp paper towel.
Well, we haven't turned purple and shriveled up yet, so apparently lightly and quickly washing them isn't doing them any tremendous harm.
So long's I'm on the subject of cooking, isn't it vexatious when one has a dish all put together and ready to go into the oven, only to find one of the ingredients still sitting on the counter?
This evening I made a Ham and Broccoli Pot Pie (which I rather liked, Don tolerated, and Dmitry didn't eat, instead making a bologna sandwich). As I lifted the crust to place it on top of the pie filling my eye lit on the can of mushroom soup I'd neglected to stir into the filling. I stared balefully at it. It sat sheepishly next to the stove, obviously wishing it were safely back in the pantry.
Decided to heck with it. If I couldn't tell it was missing, then how crucial could it be, right?
Comments (11)
Well, like you yourself said in your instructions in the Thumbprint Cookies, I've yet to use a double boiler to melt chocolate. In fact, I'm rather rash and barely use low heat for anything.
I've never used homemade chicken stock, trusting Campbell's much more than my own stock pot.
I use pre-shredded cheese.
I too wash mushrooms with abandon under running water (actually, I PREFER canned mushrooms...fresh 'shrooms are too earthy for me).
That's all I can think of at the moment. I know I break rule after cooking rule however. Good topic!
The mushroom thing can make ya nuts if you let it. I have in the past, washed mushrooms. Since now I have to sit to do food prep, using a damp cloth to clean the silly things makes sense for me. Dumping them in the colander and having it it seems so much better!
I haven't forgotten ingredients anytime in recent memory. I'm a pretty methodical cook, and also creative. I know the main idea of a recipe, having done a recipe sweep from various sources, but I'm not confined to a single recipe. I plan to use this instead of that and I don't even like that, so what comes out in my kitchen often doesn't deserve it's original name.
Hey, it's your kitchen, your food, your family you're feeding. Be wild! Leave out the mushroom soup! It's full of sodium anyway!
me<><
What nutcase doesn't use pre-shredded cheese? Pre-shredded cheese is one of the culinary advances of our time, IMO.
I remember years ago - before not only pre-shredded cheese but food processors - when I wanted to make macaroni and cheese, it meant buying a block of cheddar, getting a grater and a bowl, and having at it.
It didn't take a lot of that to cause me to decide Kraft's boxed stuff's not so bad. We ate that for years, until the pre-shredded cheese hit the dairy shelves.
I box grate cheese for mac n cheese. It really isn't too hard. I'd use my food processor, but I broke it
They put stuff in the pre-shredded cheese to keep it from clumping, you know. (Not that I don't uses it ... I do a lot. We love cheese at our house) But if the recipe calls for a whole bag, it is likely I'll shred my own.
I guess I'm a nutcase ... :p
Had my suspicions in that regard, Dawn, and you've just verified them. =8^o
There are Conventional Cooking Rules?
=8^o
Well, yes, Kelly. Julia Child invented most of them, and the Joy of Cooking editors, in cahoots with the Goodhousekeeping people wrote the rest. Betty Crocker, that rebel with the mixes, along with Duncan Hines, have been doing everything they can, in their illicit way, to break all the rules, and incite millions of others to do the same. And we won't even mention the Kraft family! The things they've led us all to do!
We use all kinds of cheese, except for the truly gourmet and expensive ones. Anything over $8.00 a pound is too much for cheese, unless someone else is buying.
me<><
Cindy! You crack me up! The things the Kraft family has led us all to do! Ain't that the truth! LOL
I never knew it was CW not to wash mushrooms. It wasn't that many years ago that Wegmans was selling mushroom scrubbers in fact -- shaped sort of like an old-fashioned shaving brush, only the bristles were shorter and stiff. Not that I ever invested in such a thing!
I still usually grate cheese by hand. Pre-shredded is more expensive and my kids love chunk cheese for a snack, so it's always around anyway. Washing out the food processor is more trouble than it's worth, and I have three labor-free cheese graters around, anyway -- one's named Susan (who often volunteers), and the other two are named Anna and Maria.
I just saw an article in today's paper about how cookbooks are getting dumbed down. They're eliminating words like "cream" and "simmer" (SIMMER?!) because people don't know what they mean anymore. So now it's "mix together in a bowl until smooth" or "cook on low heat."
There was a five-question quiz accompanying the article. My hubby gave it to my seven and eleven year olds, and they both got four out of five. It's not THAT hard!
Omigoodness! TO "cream" and "simmer" something is now difficult?
Pitiful. Just pitiful. >:^<
Isn't it peculiar cookbooks get dumbed down at the same time cooking shows proliferate on FoodTV, etc.? And kitchens get more and more expensive?
Oh, that's really sad. I love my grandmother's old red plaid Better Homes and Gardens cookbook. Mom gave it to me when I got married and that's how I learned to cook - most of the sections start off with basic cooking instructions. It's too bad modern cookbooks won't do that and TEACH the terminology in their books!
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