This blog may contain affiliate links. These links will take you to websites that sell items. If you use these links to buy items from these sellers you are helping to support Professor Kitchen at no extra charge to you. Thank you very much!!
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As the banner of our blog states, we want to teach you how to cook and not what to cook. One of the first things a new cook (and some times an older cook) needs to learn is how to use his tools, and one of the most important tools is the knife.
One of the talking heads on TV once said the most important thing that a cook needs to know is how to dice. If not done correctly you could end up with no fingers and no dinner.
Your Knife
The first thing you should consider is the knife itself. It should be the best you can afford. It is better to have two or three really good quality knives than a drawer full of so-so knives.
Your knife should be able to hold an edge (stay sharp).
More people are hurt by dull knives than sharp ones.The reason why is simple. If you are trying to force the knife through something you have trouble controlling it. When using a knife, control is the first step in safety.
Along these same lines, this is a time when size matters.
You need a knife that fits the job. Don't try to dice an onion using a paring knife.
I prefer to use the chef knife. It is big enough to grip, heavy enough to help slice.
If you have kept it sharp, slicing and dicing will be easy.
The main thing to say about fingers is this: “keep them out of the way”.
Whether slicing or dicing, Keep your fingers tucked in.
That is, have the ends of your fingers pointed back toward the palm of your hand. This should have the second joint of your fingers pointed down. These fingers will provide a guide for the knife as you slice down.
The slice can be either thick or thin. Hold the object you’re slicing as above with the part you want to be sliced off sticking out in front of your fingers. Put the point of the knife on the cutting board and, using your fingers as a guide, bring the knife down. Imagine a hinge where the point of the knife and the cutting board.
To make the next cut don't move the knife or your hand, simply use your thumb and slide the food forward and repeat.
Your Dice
To dice, use the tip of your knife to make small slices in the food without cutting all the way through. Then do the same going down. Then use the slicing technique to finish off your dice.
This blog may contain affiliate links. These links will take you to websites that sell items. If you use these links to buy items from these sellers you are helping to support Professor Kitchen at no extra charge to you. Thank you very much!!
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The subject of barbecue can cause some pretty strong reactions. When you understand the history of this method of cooking, you'll understand why.
First, some definitions
It's important that we start off with defining what we mean when we say barbecue.
A grill that can also barbecue.
Unfortunately, many people think that if you cook something on a grill then it is BBQ. Not so. While some grills can be used to barbeque not all of them can be. Grills are used for grilling. There are many cultures that barbeque that don't have grills.
Barbeque is a method of preparing food, not the food that is prepared. It is a low, slow, and dry cooking method that utilizes the heat in smoke to do the cooking.
In fact, the word "barbecue" comes from the South American Spanish word "barbacoa" which in turn is from the Haitian word "barbakoa", which is the name for the wooden structure that held the meat out of the fire and in the smoke.
Well, maybe it did. There is some debate about that.
Some people believe that it comes from the French "barbe à queue" which can be translated as "from beard to tail". As barbeque started with roasting whole pigs, one can see where this might work.
Except... that the French didn't give us BBQ, the Germanic peoples did. Oddly enough, there is no theory on a Germanic origin to the word.
Pigs are not native to the Americas. You'd never know that by the absolute domination they currently have over this hemisphere, but it's true. Hogs were brought over here by European settlers. This seems to have first started when the Spanish conquistadors came over to try and make a home for themselves here.
While the Native Americans didn't really take a shine to the Spanish settlers and worked pretty hard to drive them out, they certainly appreciated the horses, cattle, and hogs the retreating settlers left behind!
King of the Carolinas!
When the Germanic settlers come over about one hundred years later to what is now the Carolinas, they also brought with them pigs. Along with the pigs they brought new methods of processing these porcine delights.
The Que you Knew
The Germanic people are really great at processing meat. They brought over their love of sausage and many other processed types of meat. Most meat processing takes quite a long time to do and these settlers had a bunch of homesteading stuff they needed to accomplish so that they didn't, you know, die.
To give them the time they needed, these settlers started using a system very similar to the Haitian barbakoa. They would put a whole pig high above a smoky fire and let the heat from the smoke cook it for hours. This would keep off flys and bugs while also not burning it.
This long, slow, dry heat works really well at breaking down fat and connective tissue and making the meat very tender. Because it also dried the meat out, the process also helps it to last longer after cooking.
Then, in the early 1800s, more of the Germanic peoples immigrated to the US. This time to Texas. Taking a look around at this new land, they found the cattle and pigs that the Spanish settlers had left behind so many years ago.
Being the swave and sophisticated cooks that they are, these folks quickly realized that 1 cow would feed a lot more people for a lot longer than 1 pig. So they started using the same barbecuing method the previous folks did on cattle.
The Debate Rages
Now we have the setup for what would become the Great BBQ Debate!
Pork reigns supreme on the East coast while beef holds sway in Texas. To this day, this is the history and culture of BBQ in these areas. Folks will argue day and night over the benefits of their favorite.
But, really, which is the real King of the Que???
Watch My Video To Find Out the Answer!
I know, I know. Stringing you along and then bumping you off to YouTube. What can I say, I gotta self promote!!
Make sure you subscribe to my blog to get a notification every time I release a new article.
This blog may contain affiliate links. These links will take you to websites that sell items. If you use these links to buy items from these sellers you are helping to support Professor Kitchen at no extra charge to you. Thank you very much!!
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Sometimes the tools we need to take our cooking up to the next level are right in front of us but we can't see them.
Take the humble refrigerator.
Our fridge - Fingerprints and all
Here in the States, it's a rare household that doesn't have a chill chest. Even going into the backwoods of more rural areas, you may find houses without air conditioning or an indoor toilet, but they will have an icebox.
That's not an exaggeration. My wife's grandmother passed just a couple of years ago. All of her life she lived without a telephone, indoor toilet, or central heat. She did have a window unit but only turned it on in the hottest of days (and only when she had company if the stories I've heard are true).
While the storage capabilities of the refrigerator are well utilized, it's capacity to augment the flavors in a dish are mostly unused.
While the icebox was designed to keep food from spoiling so quickly, that's not all it can do! It's cold, protective insides can be used to nurture flavors in order to grow them to magnificent proportions!!
Our current stash
Ok, that is just *a bit* of hyperbole, but the point is still valid.
One reason that many people love leftovers is that the time just chilling in the fridge gives all of the flavors time to react to each other as much as they can.
If you've got a sweet and spicy dish then having it spend some alone time on a dark, cold shelf will give these two opposites time to get to know one another. Then, when heated up again, they know how to work together on your tongue so much better!
This trick doesn't just work for opposite flavors. All of the flavors in your dishes will benefit from spending some time in your chill box.
Here's more on the subject
Give it a try!
The next time you're going to make a meat sauce, soup, casserole, meatloaf, or just about anything else, make it a day ahead of time and give it time to chill.
I think you'll be glad that you did!!
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