nanceeeb's tips: Dried Fruits, Cutting & Re-Hydrating

Dried fruits can be wonderful baked into cakes. An easy way to cut them up, yet still leave them chunky, is to oil a pair of scissors and snip away. Each time the fruit builds up on the scissors blade,run a razor blade scraper along the sides of the scissors and add a film of oil to them. Begin again. Don't forget to re-hydrate those dried fruits before you bake. Use any liquid with flavor. Heat the fruit and liquid over a flame or in the micro-wave oven. Off heat, allow the fruits to sit and macerate until they are plump and luscious. They can also be re-hydrated in a strainer placed over boiling water. This method takes longer and some of the fruit juices are lost in the boiling water. (That flavored water could be used to bake Ham. See recipe on this blog.)
c.Nancy Bookman Hoffman

Browned & Clarified Butter

Browned butter has a distinct flavor all its own. It is delectable and can cut the amount of butter used in half because the flavor soars. To brown butter, simply melt a stick in a pot or pan. When the foam subsides, lower the flame and watch the bottom carefully. That is where the milk solids fall.

At this point the clear melted butter can be poured off the top without disturbing the bottom solids. That clear liquid is called clarified butter, or ghee, often used in baking.

Back to browning the butter: when the milk solids are tan and toasted, quickly remove the pot or pan from the flame. They burn quickly. The browned butter can be re-solidified in the refrigerator for use in baked goods. It can be combined immediately with toasted bread crumbs to top cooked vegetables, fish or casseroles.

If clarified butter is called for, reserve the milk solids to enrich a gravy or casserole. Clarified butter keeps longer than butter with milk solids. Butter is actually only 80% fat, 18% water and the rest is milk solids.
c.Nancy Bookman Hoffman

Poultry Seasoning

Once in a while poultry, particularly turkey, can have a nasty, bitter taste. To eliminate any thought of that occurance wash out the cavities and the flesh of the bird with a fresh lemon or two. Next generously sprinkle the bird inside and out with powdered ginger. This sweetens the bird without flavoring the finished product. Then add personal additional seasonings. Substitute two Tablespoons of dry white vermouth, white wine, frozen apple juice or another citrus juice for the lemons. Whatever is used should be acidic. Keep a constant supply of powdered ginger on the shelf. It is a remarkable neutralizer.
c.Nancy Bookman Hoffman

Trussing a Bird

Many people like to get out a big needle and strong thread and sew a bird closed. Still others are adept at trussing with butchers' cotton string. I have become fast and adept at using stainless steel trussing pins. When the butcher has made an accidental extra slash, start a pin above the cut, enter the skin only and weave in and out down the length of the error, alternating sides of the cut. Pin the neck skin under the bird with the same in and out stitch, whether or not that cavity is stuffed. Then put the bird's elbows (pinions) up by its neck and bend the wing tips so that they further anchor the neck skin. Run one pin from the top of the slash of the bottom cavity down towards the tail. A small opening can remain. With the longest pin, start by going from the outside of one ankle, through the nearest skin flap of the cavity, then through the tipped up tail and through the other cavity flap and second ankle. This keeps the legs hugged close to the bird. Pour two Tablespoons of dry white vermouth into the cavity to keep the breast meat moist. If the cavity opening remains wide, place something there: the neck (seasoned and greased), one half a lemon, a small apple or an onion.
c.Nancy Bookman Hoffman

Wrapping Well with Plastic

In the bakery where I worked we had to seal our products very well. We also had to get back into them fast when we needed to unwrap them. Pull out enough plastic wrap to go under and over the container or sheet pan. Place the whole container on top of the plastic. Pull the plastic up and over the container. Pull the last bit of plastic out of the box to overlap the first end. Cut and seal on TOP of the product. Pull the plastic sides up on TOP of the container, too. Thus all of the ends of the plastic rest on TOP of the product and the product is tightly sealed inside an envelope of plastic. If the container, such as a sheet pan, is too wide for the plastic, cover one half of the pan lengthwise as above, then repeat, overlapping the plastic down the center, for the second half of the pan. Sealing this way should prevent "freezer burn", and prevent blind searching for ends underneath a wrapped product.
c.Nancy Bookman Hoffman