Tips and Technics

This post is going to be a few tips or technics that you may or may not know. These are a few things I have learned over the years in the kitchen.

Last week I talked about a pear pop over. If you remember I used a puff pastry. When I make the pop over I cut out what I needed and had some left over. Instead of throwing away the excess, what you can do with the left over is combine it all and roll it out again. You can make it into a smaller pop over or do something different you might not think of doing in a large quantity. I am always looking for new things to try but sometimes I don't want to make a whole item especially if I don't know how it will turn out. This is a perfect opportunity to have fun and just try new things.

What I did with my left over puff pastry is rolled it out and then cut it into squares. I then filled them with some apple slices that I cooked in some brown sugar earlier. I then connected the ends and baked the pastry off. I call it an apple pocket.

I love bacon. Which is a little odd to me since I am not a pork fan. Bacon though is a whole different meat I feel like, I would put it in its own category. What I love even more about bacon is the fat. When you put it in the pan and all the grease it makes is not something you should throw away. After I eat the bacon I collect the bacon fat in a mason jar. What is great about it is that bacon grease is high in fat. This has the great bacon flavor with a similar fat as butter. This means you can substitute bacon fat for butter. That is exactly what I did when I made warm Carmel. Instead of butter I used bacon fat, then a little brown sugar and heavy cream. I whisked that on the stove until the sugar disintegrated. Then put it in a jar to cool. What's great about this is dipping sliced apples in it while it cools. Since I had Carmel I decided to make a play on apple pie. I sliced up some apple and rolled out some fresh pie crust. I then spread the bottom of the pie with Carmel and added the apples then of course more Carmel's. While that cools you make your dinner.



Since you were able to save your butter for your dinner what I like to do is brown it. In a skillet I just melt the butter till it gets a nice brown color. This does not mean it's burnt. (Know you can burn butter that would be the next step so make sure it's browned not burnt.) Browned butter gives off a nice nutty scent, it also gets little granulates in it. Brown butter is perfect for those meals that you have had a hundred times. I added it to pasta and broccoli. This nutty flavor just changes the taste enough to make something you think was plain to something with great flavor.

A few tips on this simple meal to know is that whenever you make pasta no matter what type you always want your pasta to be al dente. This means the pasta is still a little hard. You don't want your pasta to be crunchy but not too soft either. An old trick I was always told was to take a piece of pasta and throw it on the wall. If it sticks then you know its ready. I don't like throwing my food so I just pull out a piece and eat it. I also steam my broccoli.  When you steam broccoli you don't want it to be under done or it will still taste raw. You also don't want it to soft or it just looses its integrity. To test to see if you cooked it to long you can always take a piece between your palms. If it turns to baby food when you apply pressure its over cooked. If it bounces back then you got the perfect cook time.

With these few tips and tricks even a simple dish turns perfection. Always remember scraps are the perfect way to test those items you have wanted to try out.