121. When a recipe specifies separating your cake mixture into two pans, you can just bake a single layer in one pan – but be sure to increase your baking time for 7-10 minutes.
122. To see if your cake is perfectly baked, slip an ordinary dinner knife straight down into the cake center and pull up the same way. If any batter sticks to the knife, your cake is not yet done.
123. When frosting a cake, make sure you cool it completely and brush loose crumbs from its surface with a soft pastry brush. Always frost the sides before the top.
124. To keep your plate clean when frosting a cake, slide strips of wax or parchment paper under the edges. The strips will be easy to pull away from the cake when you have finished, and you won’t disturb the cake.
125. Want an easy way to produce perfectly frosted cupcakes? Dip the cupcake top in your frosting, turn it and twist it out again. This will give you a professional-looking swirl on top, eliminates messy spatulas – and takes seconds.
126. When making a chocolate ganache, be sure to use equal parts chocolate and cream. If using it as an exterior glaze, add a spoonful of olive oil and stir completely, to give a nice sheen to your glaze.
127. Vary your liquid ratio slightly, when making chocolate ganache. The basic ratio to start with is equal parts chocolate and cream – but a truffle filling will take less liquid and a glaze slightly more.
128. When making a stiffer ganache for truffle fillings, use a chocolate with a cacao percentage as low as possible – they emulsify a lot more easily than chocolate with a high cacao percentage.
129. Always use a recipe that specifies the cacao percentage: To do otherwise is to run the risk of making a recipe created for a different cacao percentage than the chocolate you are using – and this can seriously affect your ganache.
©Copyright 2014 ♦ T heFoodCho p per.com ♦ All Rights Reserved | Page 12 of 32
365 Cooking Tips & Tricks Every Cook Needs To Know
130. When adding fruit or nuts to any cake recipe, sift the fruit or nuts lightly with a tablespoon or two of flour, using a fine-mesh strainer or sieve.
131. For a quick, impressive dessert, tear up any cake into chunks and line the bottom of a glass bowl or in individual parfait glasses. Spread loosely with strawberry jam. Garnish liberally with whipped cream.
Congratulations! You have just made Emergency English Trifle. (Add a can of Devon Custard between the jam and the cream, if you have any in your pantry.)
132. Purchase meringue powder as a staple item in your kitchen, if you make a lot of frostings. Add a teaspoon if you are using more than ½ cup of sugar in any frosting or icing.
133. When making pumpkin pie, you can cook the filling in the top of a double boiler and add it to a perfectly-baked pie shell, if you prefer. (Chill pie before serving.)
134. When making muffins, stir only till liquid and dry ingredients are barely mixed. The batter should be lumpy – not smooth.
135. For crisp cookies, store in a loosely-covered container. (Cool completely first!)
136. Reheat muffins by wrapping them in tinfoil (you can put them all in the same tinfoil “package” and heat in a 400°F oven for 15 minutes.
137. Restore crispness to cookies that have inadvertently gone soft by putting them on an ungreased baking sheet and heating in a 300°F oven for 3-5 minutes.
138. For soft, chewy cookies, store in an airtight, completely-sealed container. (Cool completely first!) 139. If you want to become a dessert maven, learn the classics such as fondants (heavy sugar and water pastes, used in fillings or as an icing layer on a cake) and Chantilly creams (heavy whipping cream, sweetened). Of the two, Chantilly cream is particularly useful for beginner cooks and bakers, being easy to whip up in seconds.
(The key is to make sure you use fine fruit sugar, well-dissolved so there is no gritty texture.)