Food

To Make Tender Meat, Use A Crockpot Or A Pressure Cooker

Without a doubt, my favorite cooking device is the crockpot.  Being able to throw a few ingredients together and leaving them unattended for 6 to 8 hours only to return to a perfectly executed meal is just about the greatest thing going.

I just love serving up a super tender pot roast that falls apart with a fork. Nevermind the flavorful gravy made from the drippings left over from cooking.  With a crock pot, there is no worrying about over cooking; the longer it simmers, the more tender it becomes.  

Of course if you're pressed for time, a pressure cooker can give you about the same results in a heck of a lot less time.  Though with a pressure cooker you need to be right there while it cooks.  I like that the crockpot is more like a gourmet robot that works by itself.

Deep Fried Butter... Would You Eat It?

The Minnesota State Fair is well known for their deep fried cheese curds.  Food on a stick is the reason we Minnesotan's make the annual trek to the Twin Cities. 

Now the Texas State Fair has pulled off a one upmanship like no other.  This year they have deep fried butter!

Whipped and frozen as little round globs, the butter is dipped in batter and quickly deep fried.  Sprinkled in powdered sugar, they are said to taste like a hot roll with butter.

Personally, when it comes to fair food, the best thing to dip in melted butter is an ear of good old fashioned sweet corn on the cob.

How To Survive Flu Season, Eat A Balanced Diet With Lots Of Fruits & Vegetables

HiNi pandemic, normal flu season, flu shots, how's a person to survive all this drama?  For starters what you eat can greatly reduce your chances of catching the flu all together.  Here's 5 ways to prevent the flu, and surprise eating plenty of fruits and vegetables is on the list.  What you eat can address other maladies as well.  Certain foods act as home remedies for many other conditions too.

Loading up on vitamin C will help you ward off that evil flu bug and practicing good hygiene will help prevent the spread of the disease when it does hit.

Keep hand sanitizer with you and avoid personal contact as much as possible.  Remember to sneeze into your elbow and if you do come down with the flu stay home so others don't get it.

All-Natural Peanut Butter Isn't Necessarily All Good

I think peanut butter was specifically invented to go along with grape jelly on bread. 

It's the mainstay of every 6-year-old's diet, but not all peanut butter is created equal.  Many manufacturers mix some bad things in with their good peanut butter just to make it shelf stable and more marketable. 

Good all-natural peanut butter needs no other ingredients beyond peanuts and salt.  Anything else you might find on the label is intended to prevent the natural oils from separating and floating to the top of the jar. That's good for marketing, but not good for your body.

Before you make your next peanut butter sandwich, you need to ask your self these 10 questions about peanut butter. Maybe you'll laugh, maybe you won't.  I make no guarantees.

Celebrate The Fall Apple Harvest: Make Applesauce & Cider

Fall and fresh crisp apples just go together.  Orchards are brimming with crimson fruit.  Across the country, festivals and sales are taking place as this is the time of year to stock up on apples in any shape or description. 

At a loss for things to do with that bushel basket of goodness you just picked up at the Farmer's Market?  Here are some great ideas:

• Make your own applesauce, nice and chunky with just the right amount of cinnamon to suit your taste. 
   
• Arrange a fall harvest gift basket with apples and other late season specialties. You know there's someone in your neighborhood who would appreciate such a gift. 
   
• Make some homemade apple cider, fresh squeezed is always the best.

I bet you didn't know that apples rank as one of the fruits least subjected to pesticides.  Many orchards pride themselves in being totally organic avoiding pesticides completely. You might even try one of those fad diets by eating 3 apples a day.  If 1 will keep the doctor away, maybe 3 will keep the bill collectors away too!

How To Make Pancakes Exciting

Whether you're fixing breakfast or supper, pancakes are a quick easy meal that everybody enjoys. 

You can go the easy route by using an "only add water" premix, or you can make your pancakes special.  I tend to go with special myself.  It really doesn't take much extra effort. 

Here are a couple of my favorites:

• Brown sugar sourdough pancakes
   
• Made from scratch buttermilk pancakes

As a child, my depression-era father often made his favorite pancakes -- which in turn became my all time favorite pancakes: buckwheat pancakes from a recipe that allows the batter to ferment at room temperature overnight.  This makes for a stronger -- almost tangy -- pancake, but in my mind the most satisfying of all pancakes. 

If you have wheat allergies, buckwheat is also gluten free.  My wife, on the other hand, just likes to add a little almond extract to the standard out-of-the-box pancake mix. 

There is so much you can do with pancakes to make them extra special.  Get creative and enjoy!

How To Make Nutritional Labels For Your Homemade Foods

Watching your fat intake?  Eating a low-carb diet?  Checking every item on your shopping list to see what damage it will do to your diet? 

If you're spending lots of time reading the nutritional labels on foods, what do you do when it comes to homemade foods that you've made from a recipe? 

You can make your own nutritional labels from the recipe ingredient list.  Just enter the quantities and Recipe Builder will generate an accurate accounting of calories, fat, protein, etc. This is great if you're making your own granola or other high energy snack foods.

Surprisingly, chocolate chip granola bars are on the list of Atkins friendly snacks.  Go ahead and indulge.

3 Hearty Breakfast Meals Worth Trying

Breakfast is just about my favorite meal. 

There's something special about starting the day with a good hearty meal.  To keep my waistline in check, Saturdays are reserved for my one big breakfast of the week.  

Homemade buttermilk biscuits served either with a peppery sausage gravy or just a bit of butter and a good covering of real maple syrup are one option.  Throw in a couple eggs done over easy, and I'm in hog heaven.

Then again, maybe a nice stack of made from scratch buttermilk pancakes with some more of that fine maple syrup would be a good change of pace.  Add a nice mound of soft fluffy scrambled eggs on the side and a couple slices of thick cut bacon to go with it.  Sounds good, doesn't it?

Another good hearty breakfast is homemade O'Brien style hash browns.  Add 2 smiling sunny side up eggs on top and a slice of fried ham... Mmm goodness for sure. 

Enough all ready, I'll get the skillet!  Let's get cooking, aren't you hungry now?

Food Costs: We Complain While Others Starve

We complain about the rising cost of food on almost a daily basis.  It seems we're always on the lookout for ways to get more for our money when we go grocery shopping. 

At the farmers market we want more bang for our buck, even though it's likely to be the best freshest produce around.

Organic foods are better for you, but do we want to pay the premium price?  No.  Even when it's better for us, we want to stretch the food budget.

Here's a switch for you... as much as we complain about foot costs did you know that the average American spends only 5.7% of their income on food?  All the while, the poorest nations have to fork over more than 50% just to survive on the barest of necessities. That kind of puts a different light on things doesn't it?

Top 4 Chef Blogs That Are Worth Checking Out

There are 37,500,000 chef blogs. Give or take a million. But, that's the number that Google says there are if you search for the term.

Most of them, of course, are worthless. They are not really interesting or informative. They are not well written or topical. They are not written by chefs who have much to say (presuming they are actually written by chefs at all).

But there are some good ones. Scores of them, in fact. And there are 4 in particular I find myself going back to read frequently.

Continue reading: Top 4 Chef Blogs