differences between Haddock vs cod

Question

I saw haddock in the sale at our local grocer. It's really cheap this week. It grew my curiosity.

Are there any similarities between haddock and cod as in flavor?

I often see haddock and cod interchangeably used in the context of fish and chips.

Answer

Haddock and Cod are two quite different fish. However, they can be used interchangeably in many fish recipes. So if you want to substitute one for the other you can easily do so. When cooked, many people can't easily tell them apart. Even large food producers and supermarkets get them mixed up.

...Three of the 59 samples purchased from Asda failed to contain the right fish. Its cod fishcakes actually contained haddock whilst a haddock pie and a haddock fillet were made using Atlantic cod.

At Waitrose two out of 28 samples tested were mislabelled. One of them, a mini smoked haddock pie offering ‘flaked North Atlantic haddock’, actually contained cheap Pacific cod.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1380164/Mislabelled-fish-products-Asda-Tesco-Sainsburys-Morrisons-Waitrose-Lidl.html#ixzz1UCukDoa2

The main points where they may be treated differently are in long term storage. Haddock is not usually salted where as cod is. Haddock can easily be dried or smoked.

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Crepe ingredient substitutions

Question

I am out of milk, but I have yogurt, beer, eggs, cream, butter, flour, salt, and sugar. Can I still make crepes?

In general, what can replace milk?

Answer

Try watered down cream, as you'll still get some of the milkfat, but you don't want quite as much.

Water would probably also work for your crepes, although it would change the taste.

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What is the purpose of vinegar in this lollipop recipe?

Question

I found a recipe for lollipops. It uses 2:2:1 ratio of sugar:water:vinegar. What exactly is the role of vinegar in it?

The recipe was:

• 10 spoons of granulated/crystalic sugar
• 10 spoons of water
• 4 spoons of vinegar
• food coloring

Combine ingredients and cook approx 10-12 minutes since water has started to boil. All water has to boil out. You can test if it is boiled enough by making a drop.

Answer

It is simply to add tartness to add some balance against the sugar. The water from the vinegar will evaporate and leave behind acetic acid. There is an old fashioned type of hard candy known as vinegar candy. Your lollipop is essentially just that candy on a stick.

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Using Chakki Atta instead of whole wheat flour?

Question

I bought a bag of chakki atta from an Indian grocery store. The back of the bag says that it's 100% whole wheat flour. It was cheaper than traditional American style whole wheat flour, so I decided to buy a bag to see how well it would work.

At home, the main thing that I noticed was that chakki atta looks different. The whole wheat flour that I'm used to is tan with dark flecks. Chakki atta is a more uniform yellowish tan without any flecks, or maybe the flecks are just really small. I've used it a few times in bread baking, and it seems to work well.

My question is, does anyone have a better idea of how packaged chakki atta is different from whole wheat flour, and what kinds of things it is good for?

Answer

In theory chakki is a flour mill, and chakki atta is flour fresh from that mill. Realistically of course nothing you find on your grocery store shelves is fresh from a mill.

Atta flour is made from hard wheat, which has a high gluten content. This means that your flour is probably better for bread than typical all-purpose whole wheat flour from the baking aisle. If it is hard white wheat this might explain the color, as ground white wheat doesn't look that much darker than all-purpose flour.

Like typical grocery store whole wheat flour, atta flour is coarsely ground. This may give your bread a more grainy texture (not a bad thing), and makes atta unideal for cakes, biscuits, and quick breads unless you like them with a coarse texture in the crumb. If you would like to use whole wheat for baking other than bread, whole wheat pastry flour is the usual suggestion (or grind wheat yourself to a very find grind).

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What is the proper way to dispose of a kitchen knife?

Question

How do you throw away a kitchen knife (or for that matter, any knife)? It seems extremely dangerous to just throw it in the dumpster, even if it's wrapped up real well.

Answer

I agree on the Goodwill thing, but it pains me to think of putting tape on a knife blade -- someone's going to have to clean it off, and that risks someone getting injured.

Instead, find a piece of cardboard that's longer than the blade of the knife, and more than twice the depth of the blade with an inch (~3 cm) or more to spare.

Fold the cardboard in half, so it's now roughly larger than the size of the blade, and then place the blade so the back of the knife is against the fold (you can do it the other way, but you'll risk dulling the knife ... cutting paper isn't good for knives), then tape it down.

You want to make sure it's well compressed, so the knife is being held in by friction. You could always sandwich something rubbery in there with it to help with the friction.

(this is how I used to transport my knives when moving between apartments)

...

Another alternative, if you're really disposing of it, and don't mind dulling the blade, is to poke it into a piece of corrougated cardboard. Just find a piece that's longer and wider than the blade, set it on the edge of your counter, put a hand on top to hold it steady, and then slowly push the blade in.

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What kind of meat is used in cheese steak?

Question

I want to do some cheese steak at home. I was wondering what kind of meat should I buy.
What part?

Answer

There is no single cut of meat that is universally used in Philadelphia. Top round is common, and it may actually be the most traditional given the sandwich's Italian origins (top round is what is used in braciole and Italian beef sandwiches). It is becoming more and more common to use rib-eye, though, which is what is used in some of the most popular Philadelphian establishments (e.g., John's Roast Pork and Tony Luke's), which makes sense given its higher fat content.

As lazoDev mentioned, you should be able to get your butcher to slice the meat into thin (~1mm) pieces. If that is not possible, though, you can put an entire rib-eye roast into the freezer for a half hour or so. This will harden the meat without actually freezing it solid, and will make thinly slicing by hand much easier.

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How to recover vegetables that get “refrigerator crisper chill”?

Question

Sometimes my fridge is set to be too cold and if there is not much in it, I find the vegies in the back of the crisper start to freeze. This week it happened to mushrooms, bok choy, and radishes.

I tried to "recover" them a bit by letting them sit in warm water for 5-10 minutes before chopping up for a stirfry or pasta sauce (i.e. not heaps of cooking time). (Although not the mushrooms - I have some idea you're not supposed to wash mushrooms because they go slimy, although soaking might be different.)

The mushrooms were OK even though frozen...but the radishes were horrible. They still had heaps of ice crystals inside, and even some I cooked, I thought the ice would melt and they would be OK, but somehow they were unnaturally crunchy and it was quite unpleasant to eat them.

So is there anything else I should try in this case, or is prevention the only answer?

(And yes I turned up the temperature on the fridge ;))

Answer

I'm sorry to say this, but I think prevention is the best answer. Once you're vegetables freeze things happen at the cellular level that changes the nature of the vegetables. For example, ice crystals pierce cell walls which destroys some of the structure, which is responsible for the crispness and crunch of the vegetable. I don't think there is really a way to "fix" this, once it happens.

That said, cooking does something similar to vegetables. Cooking destroys cell walls, which is why cooked carrots are so much softer than raw carrots. I would think that vegetables that stand up to cooking would survive freezing the best (such as your mushrooms). On the other hand, somthing like lettuce is a lost cause, once frozen.

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