You may roll your eyes at the title, but everybody has got to get the fundamentals right before they can progress up the cooking ladder. If you ignore the basics, be prepared to suffer through frustrating times in the kitchen. To get your essential skills down, the following are some useful tips.
Sizzling Saut
Literally meaning “to jump” in French, this basic technique requires the use of oil or fat to keep vegetables or meat from sticking to a hot pan. Meat is best prepared by cutting into small pieces and trimming the fat off since you will be using oil or butter anyway. Prepare vegetables such as onions and bell peppers the same way by dicing, chopping, or mincing.
Start by placing the pan over high heat and melting a piece of butter. You’ll know if it’s ready when the butter starts to foam a bit and turn slightly brown. Add the meat first so that the released flavor will infuse with the rest of the dish. Keep everything moving and add the vegetables in next. This is a great way to make steak toppings or soup bases.
Cooking Perfect Pasta
With more to it than just boiling water in a pot, how the pasta is cooked will be the deciding factor to any pasta dish. All your efforts towards making the perfect sauce and side dish will be undermined with soggy, sticky pasta. With this in mind, there are a few tips to get you going in the right direction.
Don’t make the common mistake of using a pan that is several sizes too small. You can’t cook an entire bag of pasta in something that is meant to hold a couple of quarts of liquid. A good rule of thumb is to use four to six quarts of water for every pound of pasta. And before you put it in, add a teaspoon of salt to the water.
To keep the pasta from becoming one sticky mess, add a tablespoon of oil to the pan. You can omit this if you watch it closely and stir continuously. However, it is still advisable to do so because a bonus to adding oil is that it keeps the water from boiling over.
A vigorous boil is what you are looking for. After adding in the pasta. Stir continuously for the first two minutes. This boils off the excess starch and makes the cooked product even less likely to clump together. Stir every couple of minutes or so until you reach the recommended cooking time.
Don’t wait until the final minute to check if it’s done. Variations in pan thickness, water volume, and stove intensity will produce different results. The time is just a rough estimate meant to serve as a guide. Check the pasta by taking a piece and biting it. Or you can just try to cut a strand by using the spoon.
You are looking for a doneness that is “al dente”. This is how Italians call pasta that is done but still firm. Drain it an place it under running water to stop the cooking process. If you will be serving later, toss it with some butter or oil to stop the strands from sticking together.
Michelle is an accomplished contributor whose niche is writing about easy, but delectable, household cooking. Her content articles often stress the advantages of crock pot such as slow cooker recipes, which is one of her absolute favorites.
