Ingredient primers Posts
How to Make Homemade Marshmallows (And Then Dip Them in Chocolate)
Hello, Willy Wonka! Making candy is just delightful. There’s no two ways about it. And making marshmallows? From scratch? That’s downright magical. I mean, take a handful of regular old ingredients through a few very simple steps, and…presto! Marshmallows. I’ve done this dozens of times over the years, and it never fails to amaze me. [...]
Basic Cooking: How to Make Simple Syrup
We’re kicking off our Basic Cooking series with a toast! (The makings of a toast, to be more precise.) Simple syrup is gloriously useful stuff. It’s one of the building blocks of many cocktails—from classic to contemporary—and, really, it couldn’t get any simpler to make. Also known as “sugar syrup,” “simple sugar syrup,” and “bar [...]
3 of My Favorite Ginger Treats (Hello, Ginger-tinis!)
I think ginger has to be one of my all-time favorite flavors—from ginger ale to the ginger in my Chinese food, and everything in between. While my favorite way to enjoy ginger is undoubtedly in its freshest form, sometimes that’s just not practical. Here are 3 of my favorite ways to get my fix when [...]
How to Make Your Own Hot Chocolate Mix
Did you know you can make your own hot chocolate mix? As in, grind cacao nibs to a fine powder, then mix them with milk and sugar for an out-of-this-world hot chocolate-y experience? You can. And surprisingly, it’s not that hard. I’m going to show you how. All you need is a bag of cacao [...]
Hey, You: Save the Mint! And Make It Schnappy!
This week, I started to think about one of my dreaded end-of-summer chores: cleaning up the garden. Aside from all the weeding, pruning, and plucking, I needed to figure out what I’m doing with all my mint. Our front garden is positively overrun with a few different kinds—from traditional peppermint, to run-of-the-mill spearmint and the [...]
A Phyllo Dough Primer
I just posted my Buttery Greek Apple Tart recipe. As I started to write the notes on how to deal with phyllo dough at the end of the recipe, I realized that it probably merits its own discussion, since phyllo can be really easy to work with if you know how to handle it—and completely [...]
Infuse Your Booze: Making Fruit-Flavored Liquors
Fresh fruit + vodka = summer in a glass, all year round. I’ve been making fruit-infused liquors for about 10 years. I get it from my mother, who makes jars of lemon verbena liquor and blackberry brandy (and amazing Irish Cream in the winter). I know the whole fruit infusion thing has been done to [...]
Best Vanilla Extract
It’s hard to find a good vanilla extract that has strong, true flavor—and doesn’t cost a million bucks. Vanilla is the most expensive spice in the world after saffron, mainly due to how manually intensive production is. The plants are pollinated by hand, and take about five years from the time they are planted before [...]
