My Star kitchen tools

Start of the week: digital food thermometer

Wednesday, March 31st, 2010

Buy yourself a digital thermometer tonight and you are in for four days of either Easter chocolate fun when it rains or meat roasting and barbecuing when the sun finally pops out. Two types of thermometer are commonly used to temper chocolate. First, there is the long, classic glass dedicated thermometer with a non-mercury column. The second option is a digital food thermometer. Although the latter looks less classy, my vote goes for it. The classic chocolate tempering one, while extremely precise, has a low and narrow temperature range which limits its use. It is also highly breakable (drop it and you are done), which is pretty much a disqualifier in my house. Digital thermometers on the other hand are more resistant to a bit of rough handling and most have a wide temperature range making them a highly versatile option for various uses such as cooking meats or making candies. When buying a digital thermometer you need to consider the use you want to make of it. For tempering chocolate you want an instant read one, with a high accuracy, short response time and temperature readings in the 20-50 degrees C range. Meat roasting, barbecuing, candy making and oil frying will take you to much higher temperatures, so if you want your thermometer to cover all these uses, check it can measure accurately a range starting from about 0 degrees C to at least 250 degrees C. Most instant-read thermometers are not oven- resistant so they cannot be left in the meat as it cooks (i.e. only spot checks are possible). For this there are special "leave-in" digital thermometers with a separate probe that can be left in the meat, while the reader is left outside. Some of these newer digital models now claim a 3 sec time accuracy, which is good enough for candy making and chocolate tempering. I added two models in my Tasty Shop, the classic analog thermometer for careful chocolate addicts, and a multi-functional, oven compatible digital one which will not only help you with your chocolate experiments but will also become your best friend for cooking meats. Have fun!

Star of the week: THIS steamer

Wednesday, March 10th, 2010

Steaming vegetables retains much more of their flavour, vitamins and minerals than boiling them. Served natural or simply with a knob of butter and a few flakes of sea salt they should be a healthy and gorgeous part of most family meals. If you don't have a steamer or have a large, multi-part one, try this amazing silicone tool. My husband spotted this at a friend’s house and thought it was so cool our thoughtful friend offered it to him for his birthday. What a great present this was! This heavenly utensil allows you to transform any saucepan into a steamer and saves not only on the washing up but also on space in the cupboard. Buy it from my Tasty shop and get steaming!

Star of the week: Kitchen knives

Thursday, December 10th, 2009

Knives are beautiful things and a great foodie Christmas present, particularly for guys who let's face it always appreciate a bit of viril weaponry. All chefs will tell you there is a knife for every job. While a home cook does not need to own the full range, having a few different ones will make life in the kitchen much easier. Here are the most essential types: The chef’s knife (or cook's knife) is the most versatile of all, and a must in all kitchens. With a broad and pointed blade 15-20 cms long, it can be used for most basic kitchen tasks such as chopping up fruits and vegetables, dicing meat and slicing cheese. If you only ever buy one knife, get this one! The paring knife is a small, 7-10 cm knife designed for peeling and coring fruits and vegetables. The carving knife is designed, as its name suggests, for carving joints of meat. Its thin, long and sharp blade gives great control over the thickness of slices of meat and will be your best friend at the end of this month. The cleaver knife has a broad, rectangular blade and is also designed for meat, but not for carving. Its large size makes this the knife of choice for cutting through bones and tough outer flesh. A cleaver is also handy for finely chopping vegetables and herbs. Finally, the bread knife has a serrated blade for slicing freshly baked bread without crushing it. Bread lovers, you all need one. In terms of quality, the best and most long lasting knives are fully forged ones, made all in one piece from one block of steel. They are obviously also the most expensive. The next best things are knives with the blade than runs and is rivetted all the way through the handles. These will be good enough for most cooks and will last a lifetime if well kept. Lighter weight task knives don't have to sustain as much pressure as larger knives, so choose a blade that sits halfway in the handle. I included a couple of beautiful sets in my Tasty Shop, check it out!

Star of the week: Coco book (Phaidon)

Saturday, December 5th, 2009

A few weeks ago I sat in the meeting room of a PR agency with a display full of cookbooks. My neurones went into overdrive as I started browsing this treasure trove, crossing my fingers the people I was about to meet would be awfully, terribly late. A beautiful book caught my eyes: "Coco, 10 world-leading masters choose 100 contemporary chefs". With a devilishly pretty cover, a masterful page layout full of pictures and a multitude of colourful ribbons to mark the pages you want to go back to, I was already taken over. But the best part is the contents. As the title of the book indicates, it is a compendium of 100 global rising talents chosen by 10 top chefs, Ferran Adria, Mario Batali, Rene Redzepi, Alice Waters, Jacky Yu, Gordon Ramsay, Fergus Henderson, Shannon Bennett, Alain Ducasse, and Yoshihiro Murata. There are beautiful pictures of the chefs and their dishes, including actual recipes for a full menu by each chef. Ultimately though, this is not a cookbook but a wonderful read to learn about cuisine, passionate people, restaurants, and today's world cooking trends. There is no doubt it will be out of date in a few years but I cross my fingers that this book is the first of a long series. It will also be fascinating to follow the path of all these chefs and see whether any of them will become the new Ducasse or Bennett. A wonderful reference to go back to over and over, backward and forward, and the ultimate foodie present. My hosts unfortunately came into the room before I could sneak the book under my large jumper, so it is now at the very top of my Christmas wish list!

Star of the week: cast-iron casserole

Thursday, December 3rd, 2009

In France, it is called cocotte and is a ubiquitous fixture in every self-respecting kitchen. The cocotte lost a bit of interest in the nineties but with the renewed interest in quality and authentic cooking, its use has been peaking again. I got mine as a wedding present, which explains its rather not-to-my taste orangey colour. But boy, have I used it in my ten-year ownership! Did I say 10 years? Ooops. Don't start pulling your calculator darlings - I did get married very young if you want to know :-). With my bright orange cocotte I get the most tender meats and ingredients that keep all their flavours. It is the ideal tool for slow cooking stews and its ability to spread evenly all types of heat makes it as useful for searing meats, making roasts, soups, or risottos. I have used it on the hob and in the oven. I have burnt all sorts of things in it (especially when I had two under-two's), and it has always cleaned up beautifully, its inside as creamy white as it was on the day I first had it. The inside of a good cocotte lid generally has little bumps that make the steam condense and drip back into the food, allowing it to remain moist even when cooking with little juices. My cocotte has a “water top”. In addition to the bumps, the lid has a dip in the middle to hold cold water or ice cubes. This promotes even better condensation as no steam will be able to escape and all moisture is recycled into the dish. To be honest I rarely put ice cubes in the hole though, so I would only advise buying this version for a really keen foodie, as the odd shape of the lid makes it quite heavier and more voluminous, a potential problem for storage. Two great cocotte brands are Le Creuset or Staub, you won't get wrong with any of them iven if they are quite pricy. Choose preferably a decent size and an oval shape for maximum versatility (works better with fish and roasts). See my Tasty Shop for a couple of really nice ones. A useful and beautiful present that will last a lifetime.

Star of the week: pastry rings

Thursday, December 3rd, 2009

These very pretty rings also go under the names of mousse rings or rosti Rings. They will make a great present for people who, like me, enjoy making and eating good looking food. Made from stainless steel, these rings are used by chefs for serving rice, vegetables and mashed potato. Simply place the ring on the plate, fill with your chosen filling, and remove the mould. The rings are also handy for frying eggs and making individual desserts. Nice for cutting through ice cream as well, if you warm them up under hot water beforehand. Choose them with a shiny stainless steel finish for a luxurious and professional feel. You can pick various sizes, mine is a 12 cm diameter ring, which tends to make portions that are too big. I used it to chill the vacherin featured in this newsletter, and the picture you see is really a quantity for two. I suggest you get one or two 9 cm rings for multi-use, and smaller ones for desserts. Get extra deep rings for maximum versatility. I added a 9 cm set of two and a 7 cm set on my Tasty Shop. They are so beautiful to look at you can just offer a set wrapped in transparent cellophane with a colourful tea towel, it will make a lovely present. Voila, now you know the secret of my beautiful presentations!

Star of the week: Frying pans

Thursday, December 3rd, 2009

There is this big thing about NOT offering a woman kitchen pots and pans (although for a man it would appear more acceptable?). These justly do not rate highly on the romantic scale – better go for a dine-out plus jewellery option if you want a warm reception. They do however make great Christmas gifts for foodies if you invest in quality utensils they would hesitate to buy for themselves. This week, I am focussing on frying pans since good sautéed potatoes and omelettes are very dependent on having the right hardware. Here are the key features to look out for when buying a pan. Firstly, a good one should have a thick bottom made of a metal that conducts heat efficiently like lined copper, stainless steel-wrapped aluminium, anodized aluminium or cast iron (stay away from plain aluminium). With such features, having a non-stick coating on the inside is not a requirement. However the coating helps reduce the fat called for in a recipe and is especially recommended for omelettes and eggs, which tend to stick unless cooked in a lot of oil. I would therefore advise buying a pan with coating if you don't have one already. Go for top-of-the-line "arc-sprayed" or "grit-blasted" coatings, these will get you value for your money. They are much more resistant to scratching and heat and have superior and longer lasting non-stick qualities. Some pans are coated on the outside too, making them really easy to clean and maintain. The third feature to look out for in a good pan is a handle that will stay as cool as possible when cooking, and which goes in the oven. Look for metal handles that are hollowed or that are made of a different metal than the pan itself. Lastly, size matters. Most common sizes for frying pans are 20 cm (8-inch), 24 (10-inch) and 30 (12.5-inch) diameters. Which size you want depends on the size of your household. If you can afford it, get two and buy the larger one with taller sides and a lid for maximum versatility. If you can get the three, do, and buy the smallest one without coating for high heat searing. I included a couple of frying pans in my Tasty shop, Check it out and enjoy the sautéing!!!

Star of the week: Cake pans

Thursday, December 3rd, 2009

I am so excited by the recent purchase of my bundt cake pan that I had to talk about cake moulds this week! If you bake a lot, you know the importance of having a good selection of moulds. If you are starting from scratch, invest first in two good quality round or square non-stick metal pans, one standard and another with a loose base. The latter will allow you to unmould the softer types of cakes such as, for instance, my chocolate, almond and pear fondant. Flexible silicone moulds are good too for easy unmoulding but I find their flexibility too difficult to handle - you can't really move a filled silicone mould unless it is placed on a tray or cookie sheet, which I find too annoying. Additionally, because of their flimsiness, the sides of larger moulds can bend down when you are manipulating them, risking spilling your cake mixture. My brand new bundt cake pan is therefore a sturdy nonstick metal one! The flexibility and non stick qualities of silicone moulds however prove to be a great advantage for popping out smaller pastries such as madeleines and muffins without having to use a knife or requiring large amounts of buttering. For tricky shapes like these, silicone moulds are also much easier to wash up than metal ones. Therefore as far as muffin trays are concerned, I would advise going for a brightly coloured silicone mould. Last but not least, don't forget to get a 25 cm tart/pie pan, also with a loose base, to bake tarts and quiches, since for obvious reasons these cannot be turned upside down. I put a lovely selection of cake and muffin pans in my brand new (and still very empty!) Amazon shop, so get kitted out and be ready for an amazing season of Tasty Diaries cakes!

I can’t eat without… my apple slicer

Thursday, December 3rd, 2009

I actually dreamed this apple slicer before even knowing it existed. We eat a lot of apples in our household. Lots. As snack, dessert, in compotes and with cheese instead of bread - more interesting and healthier. I don't know how this happened but over the years I somehow inherited the unenvious job of dedicated family apple corer and slicer. One day, utterly depressed by this state of affairs and inspired by a sudden idea, I went into my local kitchen utensils shop and asked the manager to find me an apple slicer, describing it exactly as above. With a magic wand he made it appear out of his stock room and changed my life forever. Actually, our entire family life. Eating apples became suddenly so easy that our consumption nearly doubled. This cool little tool also allowed my to beat my personal compote making best by a good ten minutes! As the saying goes, one apple a day keeps the doctor away, or in French "Une pomme par jour Ă©loigne le docteur pour toujours." Maybe I should lobby the NHS to distribute these urgently to all households as a matter of public health? Pending my success, buy it and please thank me for my enlightened advice.

I can’t cook without… scissors

Thursday, December 3rd, 2009

As a herbs lover I couldn't live without my scissors. Chopping herbs with a knife often bruises them unless you have a perfectly sharp knife, which, let's face it, virtually nobody has. A good pair of scissors is great for chiselling basil, dill, coriander, or parsley. I also use it to cut pizza, flat bread, cold meats, as well as slicing spaghetti for my younger son to minimise damages on his and his neighbours' clothes, the kitchen floor, walls and ceiling (*sigh*...). Anyway, a great little helper one should always remember at chopping time! (the scissors on this picture are probably overdoing it a bit, so I linked to a solid, simple version)
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