You know when you want to cook or bake something, and then realise you don’t have the exact ingredient, so you give up?
Just because people tell you that’s the way things are done, it doesn’t mean you have to follow everything blindly.
Sometimes, it’s OK to go against the grain and work around things to achieve your end goal. — Compiled by PATSY KAM
1. Most baking recipes will say sift the flour first. Unless the flour you’re baking with has been kept a long time or have noticeable lumps, you don’t really need to sift it. It certainly won’t make a difference when you’re making cookies. If you’re baking a cake, just make sure you get rid of all the lumps when mixing it into your batter. There’s no difference in the taste at all, though some professional bakers may frown on this practice.
2. It’s probably for health reasons that recipes tell you to drain the fat when cooking minced beef as it’s high in cholesterol. But it’s not that huge an amount that would make a big enough difference to throw your diet off course. The fat obtained from cooking minced beef/pork/lamb provides extra taste and rich flavour to your food. It’s fine to add a bit when you’re cooking vegetables, for more oomph in an otherwise boring dish. And if you’ve heard of fries in beef tallow, you would know they’re divine!
3. Cake recipes almost always call for unsalted butter. A lot of Western recipes insist on unsalted butter as well for the cooked dishes. But you know what? Not all of us are aspiring master chefs, so we don’t have to follow that; salted butter just makes everything taste so much better, especially in sweet baked items. It also gives a different layer of flavour to your dishes. The salt level is really not discernable in salted butter, though purists may beg to differ.
4. Apart from black pepper beef, most of the time we probably use white pepper in our cooking. But frankly, pepper is pepper be it black or white, so it doesn’t really matter as it doesn’t flavour the dish differently. Only thing is, you will have black specks in your white sauce if you use black pepper, which may not look so attractive. Some types of black pepper might be stronger in flavour, but if you’re not particular, then just use more white pepper than what the recipe calls for!
5. If you find a little mould in your cheese, the logical assumption would be to throw the whole block out. What a waste, especially since cheese is so expensive in our country! Well, if it’s fresh soft cheese like ricotta, mascarpone and cottage cheese, yes, discard them immediately as the mould may have penetrated deep into the cheese and there’s a high chance of getting sick if you eat this. Harder and semi-hard cheeses like cheddar or gouda can still be eaten if you scrape or cut away the mouldy parts. But of course, there is no salvaging any cheese that smells strongly of ammonia, or is wet and mouldy – throw it out!
6. Most Western recipes call for olive oil. But we usually use more vegetable oil in our cooking. Olive oil is expensive and not all grades are suitable for high heat cooking as it has a low smoke point. For salads, sure, good quality virgin olive oil is the way to go, but if you need to cook with it, other types of oil will do just fine.
7. For the longest time, experts have said to use only white wine in fish and chicken, and red wine for red meat. But that rule has been broken so many times over. A case in point is coq au vin, which is chicken with red burgundy wine. Also, white wine in pork dishes is perfectly fine too.
8. Usually if a recipe calls for fresh herbs, it’ll be good if you have them at hand to add in. Fresh herbs do give a nice lift to the flavour. But they don’t come cheap and not all are easily available at our local supermarkets, not to mention they don’t last very long in our hot weather. Depending on what you’re cooking, quite often it’s alright to use dried herbs. You just want the scent and nuance of the herb in your dish.
