Tips & Techniques – FoodWatcher

Why You Should Cook Your Mushrooms in Water (Yes, Water)

There’s something Lucas Sin wants you to know: Water and mushrooms aren’t enemies. “A lot of us have been told that when you process your mushrooms—when you cook them—they’re not allowed to touch a single drop of water,” says Lucas in a recent episode of Why it Works. “But in my experience, I found that not to be correct.” Not only is water not the enemy, he argues—it’s actually the key to extracting the most flavor out of your fungi.

“Mushrooms, because of their cell structure and the way this fungus is set up, in between all these fibers are big air pockets that are filled with air and, eventually, whatever liquid that it comes into contact with,” says Lucas. “That’s a lot of the reason why some people say [not to] soak them in water.”

6 Common Laundry Myths, Debunked

With the help of our friends at Steele Canvas—makers of durable, high-quality canvas baskets—we’re tackling all things laundry. Here, we’re debunking some of the most common laundry myths, from freezing jeans to separating lights and darks.

For such…

For such a common household task, doing the laundry the right way can be unexpectedly confusing. From deciphering garments’ hard-to-decode care tags to concocting homemade stain-removal solutions, it can feel like everyone uses their own set of rules for cleaning—and maintaining—their clothes and home textiles. To demystify this seemingly simple chore, we’re coming clean about six of the most common and pervasive laundry myths.

The Single Most Genius Thing You Can Do to a Ripe Tomato

There are heaps of inarguably perfect ways to eat a ripe tomato—on plain-jane sandwich bread with a cushy swipe of mayo, blistered hot and fast in a skillet till the skins peel back and the oil swirls with juice, cherry babies squished behind your seal…

Molly Wizenberg's Slow-Roasted Tomatoes with Sea Salt & Ground Coriander

From Our Shop

Sale!

But the one way to make a tomato taste its most tomatoey, to become a fully actualized, out-loud version of itself, is to very verrrry slowly remove that which isn’t tomato. And the part that isn’t pulling its weight as tomato is the 94% of it that’s water.

How Private Chefs Meal Prep

Simply an act of forward-thinking cooking, meal prep takes on many different forms. For some, it’s a refrigerator full of identical portions of chicken and rice. Other times, it might be a batch of Bolognese so large it will last through the week. It could even be overnight oats, sliced fruit, or tuna salad. Regardless of preparation, the value proposition remains the same: Make your meals now so you don’t have to later.

There’s money to be saved as well. Meal prepping encourages you to buy larger quantities of food, something that typically generates savings, but, of course, the real saving comes from avoiding takeout orders when you’re hungry but don’t want to cook. If there’s good food in the fridge, that $15 burrito (plus delivery fees) is much less enticing.

How to Use a Stainless-Steel Pan (Without Worrying Your Food Will Stick)

Stainless steel is sturdy, sleek, and can be used to cook pretty much anything, making it the cookware material preferred by most professionals. Unlike its nonstick counterparts (which we still love!), stainless steel can handle high temperatures and metal utensils without the risk of damage. Cast-iron pans share many of the same benefits as stainless steel, but they tend to be heavier and bulkier—not ideal for moving around small kitchens or transferring from the stove or oven and to the table.

Then why isn’t everyone cooking with stainless steel? Well, there is one main deterrent: Unlike a seasoned cast-iron skillet or ceramic-coated nonstick pan, things tend to stick in stainless steel, if used improperly. Because of that, many home cooks—especially those who are just getting comfortable in the kitchen—avoid the material entirely. We’re here to say: Don’t let that fear stop you from cooking with stainless steel. Just follow a few key pieces of advice from the pros in our Test Kitchen, and you’ll find that cooking with these sturdy, long-lasting pans isn’t nearly as daunting as it seems.

A Guide to Steak Grilling Times

Grilling a steak is among the most iconic summer activities, but for many, it’s also among the most daunting. There’s no worse feeling than investing in a high-quality (read: pricey) cut of meat only to find you’ve overcooked it. Add dinner guests into…

We’d like to help prevent that outcome. So, we asked our pros in the test kitchen to weigh in on how long to grill steak, how to test for doneness, and the differences between charcoal and gas grills.

The Absolute Easiest Trick for Cleaning Your Grill

Why is it important to clean a grill? And how come leaving charred bits and leftover cooking oil doesn’t season the grates similar to a cast iron skillet? Well, first and foremost, grilling meats at high temperatures can actually produce carcinogens, which are then left behind on the grill, so it’s important to keep the grates maintained. Beyond that, regularly cleaning your grill will lengthen its life, prevent dangerous flare-ups, and simply make your food taste better.

We know that summer is officially in full swing, but here's a tip that will carry you well beyond the Fourth of July: how to clean your grill, using things you already have lying around. All you'll need for this quick hack is a piece of aluminum foil and a pair of tongs. Oh, plus your dirty grill grate and a little bit of elbow grease.

It’s Been 14 Years Since I Went to Culinary School—These Are the Lessons I’ll Never Forget

It’s been 14 years since I enrolled in a year-long culinary school program, and I’ve regrettably lost more knowledge than I’ve retained. Rich little memories will occasionally resurface, however: finding a spiny sea urchin on top of a locker in the cha…

It's been 14 years since I enrolled in a year-long culinary school program, and I’ve regrettably lost more knowledge than I’ve retained. Rich little memories will occasionally resurface, however: finding a spiny sea urchin on top of a locker in the changing room one night after class; holding a kelp-like piece of vinegar mother and fearing it might crawl across my hand like an inchworm; watching the two googly eyes of a flatfish stare back while I ~~destroyed~~ filleted my first fish.

As my career path veered away from the professional kitchen and to the writing table, many of the hard-won rewards from that year of practice fell by the wayside in favor of long-held cooking habits. But it took some time and distance to realize I’d retained a few fundamentals that forever changed the way I cook and see food, even if the dishes I prepare week to week remain mostly the same.

A Beginner’s Guide to Cooking With Kief & Hash

Next to my olive oil and kosher salt sits a small, hotel-size jam jar of decarbed kief. As a food writer, recipe developer, and maker of my own cannabis-infused confections, this simple form of concentrated cannabis allows me to have weed at the ready to sprinkle into any recipe without extra work or complicated calculations. Kief is to cannabis cooking what granulated sugar is to sugar cane, or all-purpose flour is to wheat: the accessible, easy-to-use version of a plant that’s been processed for home-cooking convenience.

Like all-purpose flour versus wheat kernels, using kief instead of flower cuts the cooking time for making edibles in half. It also leaves the more expensive cannabis buds for the format in which they taste best: twisted up in a joint, not steeped in butter for hours on end. Meanwhile, kief—aka the concentrated resins of cannabis plants—is easily available in states where weed is legal and is ideal because it simply melts into any fat. That’s right: You can use kief to make edibles without worrying about preparing cannabis-infused butter or oil ahead of time. Beyond the ease of cooking with it, kief tastes less grassy than flower and packs a lot more potency. In a nutshell, cooking with kief (and other concentrated forms of cannabis, such as hash) yields tastier edibles while delivering a powerful high.

The Right Way to Caramelize Onions

While following a weeknight pork ragú recipe from a celebrity chef who shall remain nameless, I came across the following, offending phrase in the method: “Cook onions until caramelized, 25 to 30 minutes.”

It doesn’t seem to matter how many articles, …

It doesn’t seem to matter how many articles, books, or cooking shows try to set the record straight. Even the experts among us cling to the hope that it’s possible to caramelize onions in 20 or 30 minutes, when in reality it takes about an hour to do it properly.

Molly Wizenberg's Slow-Roasted Tomatoes with Sea Salt & Ground Coriander

Five Two Essential Kitchen Knives $39–$49 $24.99–$44.99

Five Two Airtight Silicone Lids $40

Five Two Ultimate Apron with Built-In Pot Holders $45 $24.99–$45