Here are some simple tips from Kitchen for prepping, cooking, and seasoning designed to boost flavor in everyday cooking. Sometimes it’s the small touches that make the biggest difference.
- Wait till the oil in the pan is properly heated before dropping in spices or veggies. Usually, the temperature of the pan drops the moment you add your veggies in it. This might interfere with the sauteing process. It is best to heat the oil well and then only add the necessary ingredients in the pan.
- You can replace high-fat ingredients — such as sour cream, mayonnaise, and butter — with labneh. This strained yogurt cheese is both thicker and creamier than Greek yogurt. You can even use labneh in place of butter when you’re baking.
- Roast to mellow and concentrate the flavor. Toss veggies with a little olive oil, salt and pepper and roast in a single layer on a cookie sheet at 425 degree for about 20 minutes until tender and beginning to caramelize.
- For a healthier caffeine kick each morning, you probably try to minimize the amount of sugar you mix into your coffee or tea. But some chefs recommend foregoing the sugar altogether — and trying a dash of sea salt instead. The salt intensifies the taste of your favorite tea or coffee. And it might bring out subtle flavors you hadn’t even noticed in past cups.
- Massage strong-tasting greens like kale or cabbage before eating them raw. Finely slice the greens, then massage under a spray of warm water for a minute or two. This softens the texture slightly and removes some of the ‘raw’ taste. Rinse with cold water to refresh, then dry thoroughly and dress with a little vinaigrette.
- The seeds and surrounding “jelly” contain most of the flavor, so don’t seed tomatoes unless called for in a recipe where excess moisture will ruin a dish.
- Browned food tastes better, and the best way to accelerate this process is with a pinch of sugar sprinkled on lean proteins (chicken and seafood) or vegetables.
- To intensify the flavor of ground spices and dried herbs, cook them for a minute in a little butter or oil before adding liquid to the pan. If the recipe calls for sautéing aromatics, add the spices to the fat in the pan when the vegetables are nearly cooked.
- You can steam and puree cauliflower, and use the result in place of cream. In dishes, such as risotto or creamed spinach, swapping the high-fat cream for cauliflower makes the dish lighter and healthier. But this unlikely swap also adds extra fiber, vitamins, and nutrients to your meal.
- Greatist learned vinegar offers “a light and refreshing way to make an average dish taste way better in less than a minute.” And it’s not just white vinegar you should have in your pantry. Red wine vinegar, for instance, will brighten the flavor of braised meat.
- A tablespoon of butter or oil added at the end of cooking will add more flavor than 4 or 5 tablespoons added at the start of the cooking process. When you add fat at the end, it rests on the surface of the food instead of melding or combining with your ingredients.
- The alcohol in wine doesn’t add flavor to dishes so much as it makes other ingredients taste better. The alcohol helps release flavor molecules in foods and assists in dissolving fats, allowing ingredients to reveal their own unique flavors in ways that other liquids or fat cannot.
- Another tip you need to remember is to garnish at the last moment. Usually in Indian cooking, chopped coriander is sprinkled on dals, curries and vegetables to enhance their taste. This step must always be done after turning off the flame. Coriander leaves can turn soggy quickly if added before. All you need to do is do the garnishing and close the lid. The steam from the food is enough to infuse the flavour and aroma of coriander leaves in the food.
