thegoodfood

Archive for July 23rd, 2010

The fresh salad greens I’ve have been buying at the farmers market the last few weeks have been truly excellent but a girl can’t live on salad greens alone.  I like to mix things up a little by adding some very gourmet, buttery rich, fresh homemade herbed croutons into my salad.  The boxed croutons are in my opinion, better for making stuffing, they are almost styrofoam like – once you have made your own fresh croutons there will be no going back…I am warning you now, it’s a very slippery slope.  Now I must also stress here that the size of the crouton is critically important – using too many croutons or croutons that are too large can upset the balance of the salad and actually make it unpleasant to eat.  If you are using soft delicate designer greens you need to make sure your croutons a small, tiny even and are sprinkled over the salad right at the last minute so they stay nice and crunchy.  There is definitely an art to this whole crouton thing. 

I think the best way to start is of course with really great bread and I happen to be partial to the Ciabatta from A Bread Affair right here in Langley http://www.abreadaffair.com/our_bread.html I like to heat up a generous mixture of butter and good quality olive oil in a large frying pan. Cut most of the crust off the bread and cut it into very small squares.  Once the butter is melted and the oil is hot – add 1 clove of finely minced fresh garlic and sauté for 1 minute.  Turn off the heat.  Add the bread cubes and toss them well in the garlic butter.  Toss in ¼ cup of finely grated parmesan cheese, ½ tablespoon of finely chopped oregano, ½ tablespoon of finely chopped flat leaf parsley, a few grinds of freshly cracked black pepper and a generous sprinkling of good salt.  Toss the croutons so that the herbs and cheese are well distributed.  Transfer your seasoned croutons to a sheet pan and spread them out evenly.  Bake them in a 350 degree oven for about 15 minutes stirring them occasionally until they are nice and toasty…keep an eye, these little gems go from toasty to toast in no time flat!  Cool the croutons and store them in a freezer bag or freeze the leftovers.  You will be looking for excuses to add these tasty little morsels to just about everything!

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About the Author:
Angie Quaale is the owner of Well Seasoned gourmet food store and cooking school in Langley, British Columbia, Canada. Well Sesaoned is been the destination location for all things gourmet. Angie travels the world sourcing the best gourmet foods and recipes and is an advocate of local farmers and food producers. Angie\’s column, \”Food for Thought\” appears twice a month in the Langley Times. She\’s also regularly featured in print articles, television and radio programs throughout Canada.
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The Living Well HealthMaster Fruit and Vegetable Emulsifier is a new type of kitchen appliance with a 100-year motor Warranty. The HealthMaster Blender is a high-speed blender that is perfect for any combination of food, whether hot or cold.

The Health Master Blender is a great, new, kitchen appliance breakthrough. The Health Master Emulsifier can make soups, ice cream, smoothies, sorbet, juices, and hot drinks, while retaining all of the vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants in your fruits and vegetables. The LivingWell HealthMaster Juicer also retains all of the phyto-nutrients of the fruits and vegetables.

Other uses for the HealthMaster Food Emulsifier include crushing ice, making baby food, grating cheese, making purees, and making sandwich spreads. You do not need to pare, peel or seed your fruits and vegetables when you user the HealthMaster Blender.

The Living Well Health Master Emulsifier works with easy, simple, one-touch settings, has 8-speed settings, and has a 70-ounce carafe that is dishwasher safe. The HealthMaster Emulsifier is very easy to assemble and operate. The HealthMaster Emulsifier has a great safety feature of not starting unless the lid is on all of the way. The HealthMaster Emulsifier is a great way to introduce yourself and your family to a better way of eating at the best price and is perfect for vegans, vegetarians, as gifts, and so much more. The HealthMaster Juicer will definitely help to ensure that you and your family eat more fresh fruits and vegetables than ever before, therefore, boosting immune system function and overall health.     

The Living Well HealthMaster Fruit and Vegetable Emulsifier has been featured on TV shows such as the Montel Williams show as a perfect kitchen appliance. With the Montel Williams Health Master Blender, you get the four HealthMaster recipe books and HealthMaster cookbook that contain recipes for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. The Montel Williams HealthMaster Food Processor also includes an eating plan, a one hundred year limited warranty on the motor, and a sixty- day limited warranty on all of the other parts.    

Review more information about the Living Well HealthMaster Blender and the special free Healthmaster cookbook and recipes offer by clicking here.

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About the Author:
Rhonda Friend is a writer for AsSeenOnStore.com, a web site featuring AsSeenOnTV Products and Services.
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Candace Anderson is the author of ‘Frugal Mom’s Guide To Once A Month Cooking.’ After reading her book, I was stunned. Candace says there are step by step instructions and there are. How can I describe a guide that is so easy to use, easy to understand. It has everything you need. It is like having an expert cook and organizer hold your hand every step of the way.

Once a month cooking is absolutely awesome way to save tons of time and lots of money. Basically you buy ingredients in bulk, put a day or two aside and cook your entire months meals there and then. Then you can pop them in the freezer and take them out day by day. If you cook every evening for at last 1 hour that is 28hours in a 4 week period. Many days i am sure the start to finish of cooking dinner exceeds 1 hour. You can literally feed your entire family healthy good quality home cooked food every day without worrying about finding the time to do the preparation and cooking.

I truly believe every student in school doing a hospitality course or simple cooking class, should read this book! Even if you are retired and believe you have all the skills necessary in your kitchen to prepare and save money on meals, I guarantee you would gain more secret tips than you would have in your head right now!

There’s even a money back guarantee. Candace is selling this amazing ebook for an introductory price of only $12.95 with a 30 day 100% money back guarantee. I don’t think one person would ever want their money back because it is just excellent.

I give ‘Frugal Mom’ Candace Anderson’s guide my highest recommendation and know that no one person who purchases this book would be disappointed! Grab A Copy Click here

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About the Author:
‘Frugal Mom’s Guide To Once A Month Cooking.’
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Plant-based foods loaded with minerals such as beans, grain, seeds, and nuts contain a mineral-inhibitor phytic acid that interferes with your body’s ability to absorb those minerals. When you notice the packaging on your food with high levels of minerals such as magnesium, iron, calcium, or zinc, you should know that you will not be able to benefit from the high mineral content unless you prepare your food deliberately to reduce the content of their phytic acid. There are straightforward kitchen techniques that reduce phytic acid in your food. Soaking, fermenting, and sprouting are some of the most useful strategies for reducing phytic acid in your food. If you prepare your meals intentionally, you may double your digestion of iron, calcium, zinc, and magnesium. In some food science studies, they have found that people absorb 1000% more iron when they can eliminate the phytic acid content.

For cereal like a whole wheat porridge, you can soak your grains in warm water, approximately body temperature, over night to reduce the phytic acid. Use the quantity of water that your recipe requires, warm it to about 100 degrees, and stir the water into the grains the night before. In the morning cook the cereal as you normally would, but watch your cereal carefully and stir it continuously — it will be done within minutes and could easily burn and stick to your pan. Now that your cereal is cooked, not only will you digest more minerals, you will also quicken the cooking time of your cereal.

Because bread batter does not always soak well, your best technique for bread is to ferment it with sourdough techniques. Grains such as wheat are high in phytic acid but, generally speaking, they are high in the phytase enzyme that breaks down the phytic acid during the bread’s rising cycle. A basic yeast bread recipe will reduce the phytic acid to some degree because of the rise time required for the bread.

As far as beans are concerned, many of us soak them for some hours before cooking. To reduce phytic acid soak your beans overnight (or better yet, for about 18 hours) in very warm water. We recommend starting with a temperature of approximately 120 degrees and keep the beans in a warm spot. The water will cool over that period of time but as the beans soak up the water, add more warm water to your bowl of beans. When you are ready to cook your beans, pour off the soaking water and put in fresh water as your recipe indicates. Proceed with your recipe as it directs you.

Nuts and seeds can be soaked to reduce phytic acid, though the soaking will work better if the nuts or seeds are broken up into smaller pieces. By breaking the nuts or seeds, you increase the surface area of the food and the soaking is more effective. Soak the nuts or seeds for twelve to eighteen hours, much like you would do the beans. Strain the water and then dehydrate the nuts or seeds on a clean cookie sheet until they are crispy. You can dehydrate the nuts in a warm area like a dehydrator or oven. In the summer, a car window works too.

Techniques always tend to have special cases and there are exceptions in this case as well: Soy, corn, and oats in particular do not respond well to the soaking techniques above. These exceptions are low in an enzyme that reduces the phytic acid. Soy must be fermented — turned into miso or tempeh in order to see any notable change in phytic acid in soy. You can ferment oatmeal or corn too, but they also both benefit from adding a complementary grain to the mix that is higher in the enzyme phytase such as fresh wheat or rye. Cornmeal is often used in recipes with wheat flour for instance. Use whole wheat flour, preferable ground fresh to leverage the phytase in the wheat to work against the phytic acid in the corn.

These foods, plant-based foods packed with minerals, can be exceptionally healthy, especially if prepared in ways that reduce the level of phytic acid. If you rely on high-phytic acid foods such as these for the minerals in your diet, these techniques could improve your mineral status and improve your health. They are all easy to adopt in your kitchen preparation, so there is nothing to lose.

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About the Author:
Alexander V. Martin promotes healthy cooking and baking at the Phytic Acid website and phytic acid videos on YouTube.
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Are you looking for an energy efficient way to cook food? Well pressure cooking with an aluminum pressure cooker is very energy efficient and is very easy to cook with. It allows the cook to make every food is a really less amount of time while preserving the nutrients.

What is exactly a pressure cooker?

A pressure cooker is a large pot with a lid that locks and they are usually used to cook many things. Here are some of the foods you can prepare really fast with aluminum pressure cookers:

Soups
Stews
Beans
Meat

How do pressure cookers work?

When it is placed on a stove, the liquid inside it boils. Then the lid gets locked and its purpose is to tightly prevent steam from escaping the cooker. The pressure also increases very steadily in a pressure cooker. The pressure also builds very fast and the high temperature reduces the cooking time. Since the cooking time is fast, the steam will quickly tenderize the ingredients.

Pressure cookers have been around for a really long time and every few years they have been getting better and better. They are now very better, safer  and easier to work with because of te improvements. The old generation of pressure cookers had very bad mechanisms and if the pressure build up high, the pressure cooker would explode because of the high intensity.

Now aluminum pressure cookers are coming up with great mechanisms to prevent disasters like that. Now they are safer. Now they really speed up the cooking process and bring the cooking times really low. Pressure cookers have also been known for retain vitamins and nutrients much better. Have fun cooking the fast easy and safe way! You will definitely not regret buying an awesome aluminum pressure cooker.

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About the Author:
Shawn Kirby a professional product reviewer who has reviewed over 100 different types of products. He mainly likes to review Aluminum Pressure Cookers. Click here to view his blog for great information.
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One of my favorite clam recipes is baked stuffed clams. But, to get the freshest clams, you have to go clam digging first, and then you need to open the 300 clams that you dug up.

Heading out in a small boat to find a secluded low-tide spot that no one else knows about and spend the afternoon clam digging is a fond childhood memory of mine. I grew up on Long Island, NY and as a kid, I could walk along the shore, dig my toes into the sand and find clams to bring home.

I decided to revisit this childhood memory. It’s a beautiful day. I’ve even brought my dogs, who want to get into the act, even if they think clam digging is a game to find very hard tennis balls.

Once we’ve collected all our clams, my head begins to swim with clam recipes. In the end, I know that one of the recipes I will have to cook is baked stuffed clams as it’s my absolute favorite. However, to even start making baked stuffed clams, the fresh clams need to be opened.

There is a specific technique to opening fresh clams and a certain tool to be able to do it correctly and safely. First, it’s wise to wear gloves, because the clam shells can be sharp, but also because the knife can slip under the pressure you exert to open them and you can easily cut yourself.

The key to opening fresh clams is not to cut through the belly of the clam as this makes the clam unappetizing for clam recipes. The proper technique is to cut the two muscles on either side of the shell to expose the clam meat in tact.

Clam digging is done, 300 clams are opened, baked stuffed clams are a must…but there are so many more clam recipes to choose from!

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About the Author:
Chef Todd Mohr is a classically trained chef, entrepreneur and educator. Chef Todd’s simple philosophy – burn your recipes and learn how to really cook – has helped many home cooks and professionals alike finally achieve success in the kitchen. Learn his #1 Secret for Free and discover how online cooking classes can really teach you to cook!
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