You can use frozen bread dough, just fine.

You'll often see it suggested in recipes.

Pizza dough sometimes is made from higher gluten flour, or goes through a slower rise to make it more chewey and stretchy, but bread dough is definitely a major upgrade over pre-cooked crusts.

Another option is call around to some local pizza shops (national chains usually won't do this) - many of them will sell their dough for about $1 a ball (good for about a 14" pizza).

Sure you can use it for a Pizza and you know why ?

Because one of the most gratifying part of cooking is experimenting :)

Seriously, there are a lot of variations in pizza dough out there, some of them clamed to be THE real ones, other just pretend to.

The reality is that if it's made with good ingredients and you already baked bread out of it, chances are also a pizza would be tasty.

As @dlb wrote, it all boils down to personal tastes and how you like your pizza, but this shouldn't stop you from trying (afterall

, you're not asking if it's ok to bake a pizza using pasta ;) )

I have not found that there is a definitive answer, the most common

I know is that it depends on what you like for a pizza dough.

I know many people who use a common bread dough for pizza.

I personally find that too "bready", but they like it that way.

When I first learned, I was taught use a basic french bread recipe and add a couple Table Spoons of oil then allow to rise in cool environment rather than warm.

Many use a higher gluten flour, but if you prefer a more cracker like thin crust then whole grain and a extra pinch a salt and immediately cook after rolling out with only one rise.

If you like a thicker, chewy crust

, then I suggest letting the dough do a second 10-15 minute rise after you have it ready for toppings but before you put them on.

Most times what many of us consider a better pizza crust, regardless of if we like thin, thick, crispy, chewy, or some odd combo is one with smaller fermentation bubbles which calls for slower rising than bread.

Higher gluten, a more elastic knead, a bit extra oil and a pinch of salt can all help get this.

Starting with a regular break dough would restrict you down to only being able to go with a slower rise in my mind.

Pizza dough =

Bread dough + white corn meal+ olive oil + 12-36 hours in fridge, (well sealed in air-tight container) Scratch mix tip: flour ratio:

2/3 all purpose, 1/3 whole wheat Other: Use milk or distilled water or filtered waterOptional: 1 tablespoon of vinegar for ph balance.

Never use any alcohol based liquids such as wine etc--kills yeast!Garlic and yeast seem to love each other in fresh dough!

Garlic can be mashed or put into blender with water or milk Always use fresh ingredients in dough and toppings

As somebody who has been experimenting with different dough recipes and cooking techniques for pizza over the past 3-4 years, I can tell you that you can definitely use bread dough for pizza.

What you have to bear in mind is that there is a huge amount of variation in dough recipes for pizza - some are "no knead" doughs where you mix the ingredients together and leave them without kneading, some ask for eggs to be included in the dough, some rise in an hour, some rise for 5 days, the hydration of the doughs vary wildly...

One of the main differences to me seems to be that the different kinds of dough suit different cooking methods.

Some doughs are well-suited to being stretched super-thin and cooking for a very short time (~5 mins) at a very high heat (400°C), others are suited for thicker bases and slower cooking, some are best-suited to deep-pan cooking methods where you oil a pan and the base more-or-less fries in the pan.

For what it's worth I would say generally (and I can only speak generally) the "breadier" doughs work better in a deep-pan situation to be cooked with oil rather than e.g. directly on a pizza stone.

The main thing you will find is you can get decent pizza from most types of dough, but you will need to experiment with how to prepare and cook the dough to get the best out of it.

Furthermore, a particular type of dough may not conform to what your idea of "good pizza" is.

Odds are whatever you come up with is [i]somebody[/i]'s idea of good pizza.

In my opinion you need a relatively wet dough, a really hot oven and a fast cooking time to get a really great pizza with a crunchy-but-chewy base, but that's just my opinion and my favourite kind of pizza.

The best thing you can do is to try it.

Question: Our local supermarket sells bread dough, and I was wondering whether I could use it for a pizza base, or whether it would rise too much.  At present we've been using frozen pizza bases, but something fresh would really be nice, -I just don't always have a chance to make it myself.

What is the difference between bread dough and pizza dough?

Bread dough can defenitely be used for pizza and will be better than a frozen base, but pizza dough sometimes uses higher gluten flour and goes through a slower rise for a chewier and stretchier texture. You could also ask local pizza shops whether they will sell you balls of dough for your own use.

Bread dough may be suitable for making pizza but pizza dough is usually made with higher gluten flour. If you cannot make it, you may be able to buy it from your local pizza shop.

Pizza dough uses flour with a higher gluten content so bread dough is not the answer. Ask you local pizza shop to sell you some.


Have you considered vacuum sealing?

As you are buying larger amounts of spices to use for a whole year, here's what I would recommend.

Obtain some vacuum seal containers sized for the amount of each spice you are going to purchase.

Get some smaller glass bottles for your daily use.

When you purchase your spices and get them home, fill the small bottles with enough of each spice to last 2 or 3 weeks.

Then vacuum seal the remainder of each spice in the larger containers.

As you use up the spices in the small bottles, you can refill them from the sealed containers and then reseal them.

Hello from the humid Philippines!

I'll answer regarding the amount you keep in the jar out of storage.

I completely agree with the idea of vacuum-sealing any excess spice.

That's what I do, because I can only buy certain spices (brown cardamom, sumac, etc) in bulk.

I use a desiccant in my spice jars, which have rubber gaskets for an air-tight seal.

If you go to your local hardware store, you should be able to find screen material made out of plastic.

Cut some to fit the bottom of your spice jar exactly, put some sushi rice

(basmati also works if you can't find the really fat variety) and then put the screen on top of it.

Then, put in your spice of choice.

The rice is enough to draw out any humidity you introduce into the jar each time you open it, so your spices stay fresh and are much less likely to clump together.

If you can't find non-reactive screen material, some cheesecloth will work.

You can also just mix the rice into the spice (not recommended as rice is starchy, and the spice will clump around the grains as they absorb moisture).

Firstly, if you have any mold on your spices, then throw them out, do not risk it.

When you say that you buy them at the same time of the year, I am assuming that you are buying quite quantities.

Divide your spices into manageable quantities, then place into sealed containers, it might help to also go around the lid of the container with some tape to really keep them airtight.

This works for me living in a humid environment.

My curry powder is still great after more than a year using this method.

I worry about the rice method, as the rice will absorb the moisture and then become prone to mold in itself.

It is possible to buy cheap humidity absorbers from most supermarkets, place one in the area where your spices are stored.

Good luck...

I think the vacuum advice is excellent.

If you can't do that or if you want to protect spices that you currently use, get some silica gel packets and add them to the spices.

First, I would suggest moving any spices that still seem good (that don't look like there's mold, and don't smell off, or anything like that), and any new spices you buy, to the fridge or even to the freezer for a bit - that should let them store safely for a while, so you don't get new spices growing mold.

Next, you should probably clean out the drawer pretty thoroughly - humidity is a problem, but the presence of mold spores are also a prerequisite for your molding spices.

Having something moldy around makes it more likely other spices will contact the mold, from the spores getting on hands, or on jars, and getting inside as they are opened and handled.

You might even swap your spice drawer out for a different drawer's contents, store something the mold spores won't effect in that drawer, if you're not sure of your cleaning.

For your new, or newly cleaned, spice drawer, you want to make sure it is as dry as possible, especially after cleaning, perhaps line it with paper or something if you think the mold might have settled into corners or edges.

And make sure any jars and/or spices you add back are freshly clean (or new).

You might, as MirekE suggests, add a handful of desiccant packets to the drawer to keep it from getting too humid in the future (maybe keep an eye out for the desiccants packets that sometimes show up in other things to keep in the drawer, if you don't want to keep buying fresh).

Or occasionally aim a fan at the open drawer, so that air circulation can maybe dry things out.

If you keep checking and keep the drawer clean and dry, you might prevent the mold from re-infecting the drawer (and spices), or at least catch it early enough not to lose all your spices.

Question: I'm storing spices and dried herbs, as I always did, in glass containers into a spice only-drawer. It always worked fine. But looks that this house is particularly humid, because ground spices, and even seeds like fennel, started to become moldy, and they're not THAT old...I don't always have access to new spices, so I must buy them all around once in a year.Is there amy storage  tip for avoiding mold?

Storing spices against mold

You could have smaller amounts for everyday use and keep excess spices in sealed containers or vacuum sealed. Keep the spice drawer clean and dry to prevent mould from re-establishing itself, and make sure that the spice jars are properly air tight. Dessicant packets placed in the drawer or the spice jars themselves will further reduce the moisture.

A combination or sealed containers and dessicants or humidity absorbers are recommended for storing spices and keeping them dry. It is also important to check the place they are stored regularly for mold and clean if necessary.

Vacuum sealing or airtight jars are good for storing spices away from humidity.

Dessicants, or humidity absorbers can also be used to keep spices dry.

Check the place where spices are stored regularly and clean at the first sight of mold.


As long as the peanut paste at the bottom of the jar hasn't gone rancid, I'm pretty sure the bottom of the jar gets hardened and dry because the peanut solids have sunk to the bottom while the peanut oil has floated to the top, and as you use the peanut butter, a deficit of peanut oil develops at the bottom of the jar.

I usually try to keep re-mixing the jar as I use it, so I haven't really tried this, but I'll bet if you stir in a little peanut oil, that dry peanut-plaster would soften up and become like its old self again.

While lorel C's answer, to use peanut (or some other kind of oil) is likely the best, a couple alternatives suggested themselves to me.

I've had decent luck adding a bit of water instead - though the peanut butter should perhaps be used up quickly in that case (since addition of water will make the product somewhat less shelf-stable).

It does nearly the same job of loosening the peanut butter to spreadability, adds very little flavor, and is available very easily.

If you add too much, it does dilute the flavor a bit, but not badly so if you just need a little.

Another possibility is the addition of heat.

Warming up the peanut butter just a little will let it melt a bit, loosen up and liquify, and it can be more easily worked with in this state.

Since it will harden right back up when cooled, you might want to do this only when you're going to finish it off, or when you are pairing with an addition of either water or oil to keep the peanut butter loose after it's cooled back down.

Here is what you do guys: Heat water in pot (do not overfill) and put your peanut butter jar in ( only if in glass container obviously).

Add little, slightly heated soy milk (sweet, dense, protein).

To the amount of the picture above - add 1 tbsp.

Stir the softened peanut butter until milk is incorporated and you've achieved that nice consistency!

Consistency retrieved

✔ / Flavor enhanced ✔ PS:

Any type of milk will work :)

If you like natural peanut butter, you'll know that the oil separates really easily compared to the other stuff.

I've found that putting the whole jar in the microwave for a few seconds always does the job.

Not until it gets hot -- just until it loosens up a bit.

To prevent it: I buy a couple jars of PB when they're on sale, store it upside down in the cupboard, and then put it right-side up when I open it and put it in the fridge.

Works like a charm :)

in most nut butters the oil will separate leaving the bottom over time dry and oilless.

Especially in organic nut butters.

I found that warming the left over nut butter in the microwave for 30 seconds* at a time will help in the beginning.

But be careful!

The microwave will not completely liquefy your nut butter.

Try not to over cook it.

After softening in the microwave, I would recommend mixing in some oil that isn't too flavorful.

I found mixing in a bit of water works fine though.

You could even make your own mixes to make that last little portion of nut butter count by mixing in honey, unrefined coconut oil, or even Nutella if you so desire!

I wouldn't recommend sticking the whole jar in, most nut butters you have to peel off an aluminum seal, there still might be some on the rim, and it is not safe to microwave

So far, the best softening and taste option I've found is to add a little olive oil.

In fact, I just ate a PB sandwich with the olive oil recovery in it and it tasted scrumptious!

Question: How can I salvage hardened peanut butter from the bottom of the jar? Is there anything I can put in it that will soften it but also add to the taste, or at least not affect it negatively?

How to salvage hardened peanut butter from jar bottom

Stirring in a little peanut or olive oil will help to soften it; water can also be used, but this will affect the shelf life. You can also warm the jar in the microwave for a few seconds to loosen it up.

Three methods are recommended for softening peanut butter when it gets hard. They are adding oil, addoing water or heating.

Mixing peanut butter with a little oil softens it when it is too hard.

Water is a way of thinning peanut butter.

Heating the jar of peanut butter will soften peanut butter that is too hard.


As with franko's answer, the reason why you use salt (preferably sea salt) is that it helps to crush and mince the garlic whilst you are chopping.

If you are worried about too much salt in your diet, then do not use any other salt than what is used whilst mincing your garlic.

Like above, I don't understand why you have to discard what is on the knife

, I am assuming that you have peeled your clove.

If you are worried about cutting yourself, simply scrape the side of the knife on the edge of the board, gather it up into a little pile and carry on mincing, a bit of chop chop, then scrunch down with the sea salt.

As an aside to this, though this was always my preferred method in the past, I have now taken to grating garlic with the very fine part of a cheese grater.

This not only takes a second or two but also you don't have to peel your clove as the skin is left on the top side of the grater, whilst the grated garlic is on the underside.

I have read that sprinkling some salt on the minced garlic as you chop helps alleviate the sticking, but you may not want extra sodium in your recipe.

I've found that using either (a) frozen minced garlic or (b) adding a little oil to the garlic both work pretty well.

Why not simply get a Garlic Press and make things easy on yourself?

If the problem is readily minced garlic sticking to the knife, this is hard to solve (some pros seem to avoid it by using very high chopping speeds leaving no time for anything to stick).

To get (properly) minced garlic off the knife, a plastic(!!!)

scraper card is very handy.

If uneven mincing due to big lumps being stuck to the knife is to be avoided: Actually dicing the clove (board parallel cuts 9/10 of the length, lengthwise 9/10, then slicing) will deal with that, at the cost of wasting (or having to re-chop) an end piece.

Also, this can get time consuming if you need to prep a whole head worth of garlic...

Question: Whenever I mince cloves of garlic on a cutting board, it sticks to the sides of the knife making it a tedious task? Is there anyway to prevent this from happening when using a knife to mince garlic the old-fashioned way? Otherwise, I frequently have to wipe off the garlic remnants from the sides of the knife.

How to mince garlic efficiently without the garlic sticking to the sides of the knife?

Adding salt or oil can reduce sticking, or you can use frozen minced garlic or chop faster to reduce the time for anything to stick. The easiest solution is probably to get a garlic press.

There are a number of ways recommended to stop garlic sticking to the knife when chopping. These include sprinkling the garlic with saly or a little oil or chopping at high speed. Another option would be to buy a garlic press.

Sprinkling with salt, adding oil or chopping at high speed prevent garlic from sticking to the knife.


The classic "long-lasting bread" is rather like a very hard cracker - ship's bread or pilot bread.

Otherwise flour and yeast (add water and bake after it arrives) would be more suitable.

At some point when I had been reading too much old sailing tales I made some ship's bread - it's about as awful as the tales tell, once aged a bit (it was fairly edible, though fairly dense, when fresh, actually.)

The commercially produced "pilot bread" is a bit more friendly for eating.

Long lasting bread - what sailors these days know.

With over 100,000 ocean miles in a small sail boat, and one eye permanently on how much gas we have this is something that we have now got down to a fine art.

So, for a 3-4 week passage, wanting bread, but not wanting to bake our own (not wanting to use a lot of gas)

we set out to discover what if any 'long-life' bread was available (that does not need chilling or freezing and is to be considered 'warm storage').

Firstly there is the part-baked vacuum packed bread, normally available as either baguettes or rolls.

This should have a shelf life of up to 3 months, and takes between 5-10 minutes to bake in the oven.

Depends upon where you live, but we can buy this in any supermarket in the bread section, or sometimes in the health food department.

Secondly, we discovered that cheap sliced brown bread, in it's original plastic bag/wrapper lasts for at least a month.

It is usable for both sandwiches or toast.

I would suggest buying some and leaving it un-opened for a while,

then tasting/testing it yourself to ascertain if this works for you.

However it may depend upon where you are based as to what type of bread you can purchase.

You should also be aware of customs protocols for exporting/importing food stuffs to ensure that you are not breaking any laws.

This is one type that will last.

In the uk you can purchace long life bread products with an extended shelf life.

The longest I've seen is 7 months.

They tend to have a dryer concistency than regular bread rolls, and don't toast well.

But the flavour is good.

I tend to take them if going camping for a few weeks with limited access to replenishment stops.

If real long-term storage (months) is intended, and an oven (or a dutch oven and a fire) is available at the receiving location, the best solution would be to create a pre-mix that just needs to be mixed with water (maybe adding oil too, which you could send along), kneaded and baked.

Package it in truly air and insect tight containers (vacuum sealing, or bail lock jars or good quality clip lock plastic containers).

There are techniques that can keep breads from staling quickly (high oil/low moisture, using partially cooked flour and less gluten structure, maybe using trehalose...), but they will still eventually lose to mold with anything that's isn't very hard and dry in the first place...

You have two options here:

You go with an industrial bread with a lot of preservative.

It will last a long time but I am not sure of the nutritional value.

You go with a sourdough bread which was proofed at low temperatures and which was put in a cold oven.

The cold temperatures during proofing and the start of the baking process ensure that the bread will last longer.

Personally, I'll go with the second option for the natural ingredients and the flavor.

But I know some people do not like the taste of sourdough.

Question: My aunt lives in Venezuela. They don't have basics like bread or meat. I have been mailing her food like crackers and canned meat. I want to mail her some type of bread. I don't know what kind would last the longest.

What kind of bread lasts long?

You could send hard "long-lasting bread", industrial bread with a lot of preservatives or sourdough bread, but the best solution would probably be to send flour and yeast or bread mixes.

Bread lasts a long time if it contains preservatives or it is made using a sourdough starter. An alternative to long-lasting bread is to make your own as needed, using flour and water.

There are a number of types of bread that last a long time: ship's bread, long-life bread and sourdough bread.

Am alternative to long lasting bread is to bake your own using flour and water.


The options are very wide.

You are not telling us what kind of cake you have in mind, so I'll be making a few assumptions here.

But once you start thinking outside the box that equals "birthday cake" with "cake with different colours of icing", a whole world of options opens up.

Birthday cakes need not be (multi-)coloured.

A one-tone cake that plays with texture can be very elegant, from luscious glossy chocolate ganache to swirls of light and fluffy frosting.

You don't even need great piping skills (although it's a neat thing to master some day), heaping on the frosting and texturing into big fluffy "clouds" either with a spoon or a knife can be very beautiful and even my 7yo can produce very impressive results.

Find edible decorations for that pop of colour.

A bright red strawberry or raspberry on a white frosting, a few sprigs of mint or chopped pistachios for a touch of green.

Some lemon or orange zest, perhaps.

Even some jam or a fruit compote will do, put on top or served as a sauce on the side.

Or go for a nature walk and find edible flowers.

Choose non-edible decorations.

Birthday candles aren't edible, so you can add more non-edible elements.

Little flags on toothpicks or even a small garland held up by two or three large skewers come to mind.

Perhaps spell out "HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD" on bunting?

Print a photo of your dad and mount it on a skewer or two?

I have in the past even used toy figurines as cake topper.

As long as everything that actually touches the cake is food safe, you needn't worry.

You can use some parchment or plastic wrap to create a barrier under a topper, if necessary.

The flags in the picture below are made from origami paper, masking tape is very handy, too, because it needs no extra glue.

Since it's last-minute, I'm guessing it'll be tough to work out natural colorings, so I'd avoid doing color-based decorations altogether.

You can use chocolate chips or shavings, nuts, fruit (fresh or dried), crumbled cookies, or anything else you like as toppings.

I think even just an even coating of chopped nuts looks pretty good, but you can get pretty fancy with patterns, especially if you use more than one thing.

Or if you want something you can pipe on, make frosting and a ganache (or another frosting) in different colors - plain white and chocolate, or caramel, or maybe even fruit if you have something strongly colored you can puree.

What you are seeking are natural food dyes (or natural food colorings ).

These are commercially available and you may find them at a local health or natural foods store or even a quality grocers.

They can be homemade , if you have the time and can get the ingredients.

Examples of their effects in buttercream: (from Nourishing Joy ) Be careful not to end up with natural fabric dyes without careful checking, as many of these are toxic or bad tasting.

Takes very little turmeric to give a bright yellow colour - not enough to have a noticeable taste, especially if you use flavouring.

Got any beets around?

They give a lovely magenta red colour to food.

Diluting would give a pale pink.

Mashing fresh peppermint leaves will give a green juice but since you couldn't use much without thinning down the icing, it would likely be a pale green.

I know of nothing that gives a blue colour since even blueberries cook a purple-red.

So forgoing blue, you can play around with those three shades to make some varied colours.

None of this is helpful though if you don't have these ingredients.

Hopefully, someone else may know of others.

Suggestions: Using a stencil, a seive and some icing sugar, you can create simple decorations known as cake dusting

Consider using chocolate icing Fruit can be arranged on top to make wonderful toppings/decorations

(source: stylemotivation.com )

Jam or Jelly Got a jar of jam or jelly in the fridge or pantry?

For jam, you may want to run through a sieve to remove seeds.

You may need to add a bit of water or liquor to thin it out enough to press through.

If too thin, simmer briefly on stove to evaporate.

Mix

well to your batter or frosting for a bit of color.

Or swirl.

After apportioning batter to the baking pans, plop some jelly and swirl with toothpicks or a thin knife.

Ditto for frosting, but you may want to practice first on a plate or waxed paper.

If too thick for the frosting, thin a bit with water, liquor, or real maple syrup.

Heating in a pan briefly can also help to thin.

Another alternative: Drizzle a series of lines across the top of the cake, then swipe across the lines with a toothpick to get the fancy effect seen commonly on Napoleon pastries.

As seen here or seen here .

To prepare cake at last minute, i would make vanilla or chocolate flavoured pancakes or red velvet pancakes.

For red color, I would use color from beet.

Just grate and squeeze color from it and use how much you need.

Layer the pancakes by adding some whipped cream or chocolate ganache or cream cheese frosting which goes so well with red velvet pancake.

Top it with some more frosting and fruits of your choice.

You can definitely play with flavours and look of it.

Question: My dad's birthday party is tomorrow, and I do not know how to decorate his cake.  He does not eat foods containing artificial flavoring or coloring.  What are some methods I could use to accomplish this last-minute effort, and still suit his dietary needs?

How can I make a last-minute birthday cake without using artificial flavor or color?

You can buy or make natural flavourings with ingredients like turmeric or peppermint, but an easier option would be to dust the cake with icing sugar or top with white and milk chocolate or caramel ganache/frosting, chocolate chips or shavings, nuts, fresh/dried/pureed fruit or crumbled cookies.

To make a cake without artificial coloring and flavoring there are two ways to go: use natural toppings like chocolate, fruit and nuts to decorate or use natural coloring such as turmeric and peppermint. Natural food dyes are also available on the market.

Chocolate, nuts, fruit, icing sugar and jam or jelly can all be used to decorate a cake and are natural.

A cake based on pancakes is quick and does not contain artificial flavouring.

Natural food colourings include natural food dyes, turmeric and peppermint.


That is commonly done, and yes, any pyrex is fine for it although metal has an advantage in that it wouldn't require extra time.

Anytime you use glass, pyrex, ceramic or any other heat absorbent material for "pot in pot" cooking, add ~5 minutes to the time under pressure.

Anything that is safe to use in the oven is safe to use in the Instant Pot.

Whatever you use inside the liner of the Instant Pot as your cooking vessel, use the trivet and add water (at least 1 1/2 cups or so) to the inner pot of the Instant Pot, and be sure there is some room (it doesn't need to be much) to allow steam to pass between your inner pot and the Instant Pot liner.

Here's more on the subject of 'pot in pot' cooking.

I am new to Instant Pot also.

Had a "chat" with Ranier at Instant Pot today to ask about glass dish to use in Instant Pot.

Was told that anything that is oven proof is okay or to use a smaller Instant Pot insert.

Mine is a six quart.

I was ready to throw it out the back door last week because I was having such a hard time putting lid on.

This is going to be my favorite fun kitchen gadget.

If you want to have a minimalist kitchen, a good option is oven-safe Glasslock, which has the advantage of also providing a convenient way to pack food for refrigeration and transport.

It's also available in a variety of stackable sizes; obviously round Glasslock will fit more efficiently in an Instant Pot than will square or rectangular.

Manufacturers of Pyrex, Corningware, and Anchor Hocking do not recommend their products in the Instant Pot.

I emailed, chat with them.

I am making chocolate pots de creme and also at times I like to make creme brulee

so I use individual ramekins in the Instant Pot to pressure cook.

Question: What pyrex would be suitable for pressure steaming in an Instant Pot (also known as 'Pot in Pot' cooking)?  I am a new user and want to make sure I have the correct cookware.

Pyrex that can be used in an instant pot

While manufacturers of Pyrex, Corningware, and Anchor Hocking do not recommend their products in the Instant Pot, anything that can be used in the oven should be fine. A metal bowl would take less time to warm up though, and other options would include oven-safe Glasslock or individual ramekins.

Pyrex may or may not be safe in the Instant Pot. However, other oven-safe dishes, Glasslock and ramekins can all be used safely.

It is debatable whether pyrex can be used in Instant Pot. The manufacturers do not recommend it.

Products that are safe to use in the Instant Pot include oven-safe dishes, Glasslock and ramekins.


There are lots of potential thickeners, but you often need to select the one that works best with your given need (temperature, if it has dairy, resulting mouthfeel, etc).

In your case, you're already using rice, so you may want to stick with a starch -- corn starch, potato starch, tapioca, etc.

For these, you add a bit to cold liquid, mix it well, add it to the soup and heat it up.

As it approaches boiling, it'll thicken.

You can use flour (wheat, rice, yam, etc.), but in the case of wheat flour and possibly the others, you may have to deal with a raw taste.

You fix this by cooking the flour with butter or oil into a roux, and then adding that, and heating it up to a near boil.

You can also use pureed vegetables.

Cook them in the soup, then put it through a blender so the vegetables add body to the soup.

If you are looking for the basic and common ingredient to thicken the soup then I would suggest to go with Corn flour.

All you need to do is mix corn flour in cold water.

Add it into soup and stir it well.

And you are done.

@Joe has provided an excellent all-purpose answer, but there's one possibility I don't see mentioned: egg.

A beaten egg stirred into your rice mixture will bind and help thicken things up.

It will also make your dish a bit richer.

This is just an opinion.

I am not in too keen on using potentially gelatinous materials like corn starch or gums in this specific situation with coconut milk and rice.

Unless I had misunderstood your intention, thickening the excess liquid will only completely alter the texture.

It is a bit like you having put too much milk into your breakfast cereal, thickening the milk is not going to work "normally", you need more cereal.

So, more rice is the real solution.

Even if you wanted to improvise and make the liquid thicker, I would want to use rice flour or blend some cooked or uncooked rice with excess coconut milk taken from your pot, and then use it as your "invisible" thickener and cook the whole pot for a short while until you get the desired viscosity.

Just drain it - treat the rice like pasta.

When it is done cooking, use a fine mesh strainer to drain the excess liquid.

I can't find an online source, but I remember (hopefully accurately) reading a James Beard cookbook where he suggested this as a general method for cooking rice.

Question: Yesterday, I had some cooked rice and poured in coconut milk. The can turned out to be bigger than expected so the contents got a bit too "loose".  One way was to cook some more rice, of course. However, I wonder, is there another commonly usable ingredient to thicken up things?  I'm thinking - if it's too thick, I'd pour in some water or milk. Possibly oil too. But what if I want to accomplish the opposite?

Common ingredient to thicken the soup

You could just drain the rice like pasta, but when thickening you should consider compatibility with the purpose of the dish. A starch like corn starch, potato starch or tapioca, or wheat, rice, yam or corn flour could work, or you could add pureed vegetables or a beaten egg to halp thicken things up.

There are two ways of dealing with rice that has too much liquid. The first is to thicken the liquid with corn starch, flour, pureed vegetable of beaten egg. The second is to drain the excess liquid from the rice.

There are a number of thickeners available. The one to use depends on the food you are cooking. The options include corn starch, flours, pureed vegetables and egg.

An alternative way to remove excess liquid is to drain the rice.


Simplest solution:

Buy a more sensitive scale.

There's plenty around that can measure grams.

If that's not an option, you can sort of just about get it quite, but not completely wrong by using measuring spoons: A full teaspoon with something in it is usually around 5 grams.

A quarter teaspoon would be 1.25 grams, if you happen to have a 1/8th measuring spoon, it would be around 0,6 grams.

I'm not very proficient in baking (or not at all, really), but what I notice (or think I noticed) is that correct measurements in baking are more important than they are in cooking.

So the best advice would still be (since you're baking a focaccia) to buy a more sensitive scale.

Convert it to volume.

You can easily google the density of yeast or olive oil.

When I did it for yeast

I found that there's about 2.8g per tsp.

So, a heaping 1/4 tsp is about 1g.

I also found that 5g of olive oil is about 1.1 tsp.

The site I found is here: http://convert-to.com/

You can measure a power of two, and then divide.

For instance, you measure 15 grams, which is almost 16, and then you halve it, halve one of the halfs, etc., four times: you end up with one gram.

Or measure 30 (almost 32) and halve five times.

A decimal gram scale is a lot more affordable then many people think.

I have this one ( https://www.amazon.com/TREE-KHR-3001-Kitchen-Scale/dp/B01HKK4GYS ) and it is great.

It's accurate to .1 gram and measures up to 3 kg.

Another option that's used often in analytical laboratories for the same reason: stock solutions!

Since you want to use fairly cheap ingredients, you can create a "stock solution" (in water 1 ) and measure that with much more accuracy.

In your case, you can measure 10g

each of salt & yeast, mix them with 80g of water to make 100g of a stock solution 2 containing 10% by weight salt and 10% b.w. yeast.

You can then measure 10g of this with fair accuracy and add it to your dough, effectively adding 1g each of salt and yeast.

The main downside of this method is that you are wasting salt & yeast to make the stock, but seeing as they're both fairly cheap

I don't see it as a dealbreaker.

The other point of attention is that you're adding a bit of extra bulk ingredient (8g of water in the above example), which you might need to take into account at some other point.

Footnotes: 1:

You can substitute water for flour, or any other bulk ingredient, however solid ingredients require very careful & thorough mixing for the above method to work 2: More accurately it's a dispersion as yeast doesn't really dissolve

Question: Yesterday I was cooking a Focaccia were I required just a gramme of yeast and a gramme of salt.    When I try to use my (electric) scales, it never registers 1 gramme of difference. I also needed to weigh 5 grammes of olive oil, but i could not take out the exact quantity.  What can I do to measure very small quantities whilst cooking?

How can I measure / weigh really small quantities?

A more sensitive digital gram scale is quite affordable and could measure this amount, or you could use the volume equivalent using measuring spoons. In some cases, you can measure multiples of the amount and then divide until you have roughly the right weight.

A sensitive scale is the best option for measuring small quantities. However, if this device is not available, you can use teaspoons. Other methods include converting the weight to volume and measuring a larger quantity and then dividing the amount appropriately, i.e., measure 10g and divide into 5 parts to get 2g.

To measure small quantities, buy a sensitive scale.

You ca measure small quantities using teaspoons.

Measure a larger amount and then divide it accordingly.


Until the salt is dissolved, you will always have the problem of separate grains.

It seems that your potatoes are not moist enough for it to happen on its own.

And salt won't dissolve in fat.

My suggestion is to choose a liquid - and it can be water, if you insist on staying vegan

, else dairy is the typical choice - and dissolve the salt in it.

You don't need much, a teaspoonful may be enough.

Once you have the salty liquid, mix a small amount of potatoes into the liquid until dispersed.

Then add a bit more, repeat, using larger and larger portions of mashed potatoes, until all is mixed.

This will give you an even dispersal of the salty taste.

I make both vegan, vegetarian (ovo/lacto), and standard mashed potatoes in a few different ways.

My favourite way to add salt is to use seasoned stock or demi-glace.

There are great vegan and vegetarian options here (including homemade).

You can also grind your salt (assuming it's kosher or sea salt) in a burr grinder, or crush it in a mortar and pestle.

Alternative is to use pickling salt, which is ground extra finely to simplify the pickling process.

Smaller grains will dissolve in the potatoes faster.

I've also seasoned garlic as it roasted, and included that with olive oil (instead of vegan or regular butter).

Season roasted garlic is pretty tasty, and the heat + roasting does pretty well in dissolving the salt.

I find that olive oil is pretty great in potatoes as a simpler alternative to any form of butter.

Add more salt to the water you boil the potatoes in, or generously salt the tops of the potatoes while they are in the steamer.

Just like pasta, the boiling water is one of the best ways to get flavor into the item.

Unlike pasta, with mashed potatoes you get the ability to add flavor later as you mash, so you can choose salty things to add if you weren't able to get enough salt into the potatoes while boiling.

Try heating the butter and truffle oil and add the salt to that.

If it does not dissolve then no harm done.

You can add additional water until the salt dissolves.

Look for a vegan butter with high water content.

Soy milk and other vegetable based milks have fairly high water content.

As pointed out in comments I am aware NaCl

is does not dissolve in fat as fat is not polar.

On the butter it is a package deal.

The truffle oil needs to get mixed in so why not mix it in early and it will mix easier hot. Or start with moister potatoes then cook off liquid to get to the desired moisture.

It sounds like you're cooking with rock salt or salt flakes.

Just use regular shaker salt.

It tastes exactly the same (at least once you've mixed it up in the food) and it'll always be fine enough to mix in immediately.

Not sure how your vegan butter is composed, but could you dissolve the salt into that first?

Alternately, you could whiz your salt in a spice grinder or use a mortar and pestle to create a finer grind.

Question: I am trying to find a way to mix salt into my mashed potatoes without having unpleasant bits of salt appear in each mouthful.   I usually steam them with their skins-on, before mixing in salt, and vegan butter with a touch of truffle oil.   I have tried:   Whisking the salt into the vegan butter before mixing them into the mash. But I can still taste bits of salt in the mash.  Whisking salt directly into mashed potatoes. This is even worse than 1.

How to dissolve salt into mashed potatoes

Try dissolving the salt into the butter and truffle oil, or adding more salt when boiling/steaming the potatoes. Alternatively, you could grind your salt finer before adding it to the potatoes at the end.

If you put more salt in the water when cooking the potatoes, you will not need to add salt to the mash. However, when adding salt, to avoid grains in the mash, you can dissolve the salt in a little liquid or oil or, alternatively, use very fine salt or grind your salt before using.

Dissolve salt in a little water or in the oil and butter to avoid grains in the potatoes.

Add more salt to the water when cooking the potatoes.

Use a fine grain salt or gring your coarse grains.


If this is an oilstone (which is considered old fashioned exactly because of these issues), an oft-mentioned ultima ratio remedy is boiling it in soapy water.

YMMV, this could destroy the stone.

If you know what exact type (eg arkansas)

your oilstone is, research instructions specific to that stone type.

If it is a waterstone, abrading the stone - with a flattening plate, diamond stone, another waterstone until unaffected material is brought to the surface is the recommended method.

My uncle used a dry stiff wire brush to remove crud, then dipped the brush into a pail of sudsy water and scrub it again.

Then use a cloth with clean water (well wrung out), a dry up with a clean cloth, and a final dry wire brush on any remaining spots.

I think the best way to clean a old whetstone with lots of buildup would be to rub it on a flattening plate, which also has the advantage of flattening your whetstone.

On a whetstone for use with water you use a nagura stone.

There are natural and artificial nagura, cheap ones and expensive ones.

The nagura is harder than your whetstone.

You rub it on your whetstone in between sharpening your knife whenever you feel the surface of your whetstone is loaded (clogged) with particles.

It abrases the surface of your stone, thus cleaning its surface while also creating the slurry, the mix of water and whetstone particles needed for a less aggressive, more regular sharpening of a knife.

Here ’s a YouTube video of cleaning a stone and creating a slurry with a nagura.

While Bar Keepers Friend is a great cleaner with many uses, it is NOT great enough to clean an ultra-fine whetstone.

I use three grades of whetstone surfaces between two stones to do my sharpening jobs:

Coarse, Fine, and Ultra-Fine.

Coarse and Fine are on a single bastard stone, and Ultra-fine is a smaller dedicated stone.

The cleaning problem is presented by the ultra-fine whetstone; it remains clogged by particulates and discolored by impurities, the colors of which range from the expected shades of grey to suspicious sticky brown.

Boiling with detergents did not help.

Lye (potassium hydroxide or sodium hydroxide) did.

Two caveats: Do NOT allow it ANYWHERE near aluminum (it acts as does acid), and use VINEGAR (acetic acid) to neutralize it.

Lye works greatly on lots of things, especially when it comes to deposits involving extremes of heat and time, but it should be used with great care.

The reasons why "excessive" bathing was generally regarded as unhealthy was understandable—considering people over a century ago were horribly ignorant regarding chemistry and physics.

(nobody thought to bathe with vinegar after applying lye soap)

Question: I prefer a whetstone to a "steel" for knife sharpening. Over the years my whetstone has become loaded with steel particles from the knives. As it is basically 13 % chrome stainless steel it is not easy to dissolve. It is immune to nitric acid and hydrochloric is very slow , if at all . Any ideas for cleaning a whetstone ?

How to clean a whetstone?

You could boil an oilstone in soapy water, or scrub it with a dry stiff wire brush dipped in a pail of sudsy water. However, the recommended method would be to use a flattening plate, diamond stone, nagura stone or another waterstone to bring unaffected material to the surface. A flattening plate will also flatten your whetstone in the process.

How you clean a whetstone depends on the type of stone. If it is an oilstone, soapy water, scrubbing and rubbing are recommended. If, however, it is a waterstone an abrading stone or nagura stone  are the cleaning methods of choice.

Soapy water, scrubbing and rubbing on a flattening plate are methods of cleaning oilstones.

Waterstones should be cleaned using an abrading stone or a nagura stone.


Buy or make fresh bagels and store them uncut in a plastic bag with the air squeezed out of it in the freezer for up to one month.

When you want to prepare a "like fresh" bagel, run it briefly under water

(I used filtered water) so that the outside crust is damp but not soggy.

Wrap it tightly in foil with a small vent, 1/2" long by 1/8" wide, on one side and heat in a 400°F oven (I use our toaster oven) for about 15-20 minutes, depending upon how cold your freezer is.

The bagel will be as soft as it was when it originally came out of the oven and the hot oven will cause the crust to crisp through the foil.

Don't let it over bake or it will be rock hard though.

I understand this is kids, and they like things just the way they like them.

But preheating an oven takes time you might not have.

For me I'd defrost overnight in the fridge, then in the morning split and toast them.

To get closer to fresh-baked I'd turn the oven on to a lower temperature (no more than about 150°C/300°F) and put them in almost immediately for 5--10 minutes having just brushed or flicked water on the outside.

If you really want to take them out of the freezer in the morning, 10--30s (for 1 or 2, if doing more try 30s, rearrange, 30s) in the microwave before putting them in the oven will get them defrosted or well on the way.

Preheat your oven to medium heat, approx 350 F or so, pass your [uncut!]

bagel quickly under running water (i.e. don't soak it), and pop it into the oven for a few minutes, like maybe 5.

Bagels go through a boiling phase anyway, when they are made, so a little water contact on their outer surface won't hurt them.

I sometimes do this if I feel really fancy: Put them into the microwave for a little while (like 20s at 600W for each piece).

This will make them soft in the center.

Follow up with a couple minutes in the oven with the top heating element turned to full blast.

I actually do this in the microwave as well because mine has a regular heater on top as well.

I put the bagels on that riser thingy I got with the microwave, like the one you can see in the following picture:

So I actually do this all the time, because my local bagelery only makes pumpernickel on Fridays, so I buy a bunch and freeze them.

In fact, I am about to do this in a few days for our traditional Christmas Morning Bagel Breakfast.

After experimenting with several different approaches, this is the one I've found to work best: Storage : As soon as they are cool, wrap each bagel in aluminum foil

(I suggest also labelling what flavor it is with some tape and a sharpie), and then put up to 6 bagels in a ziplock freezer bag and freeze.

The tightly wrapped foil retards freezer-burning, and is useful when you reheat.

Reheating : place the frozen bagels, in their foil, in a 300F/150C oven, which needs not be preheated.

After about 15-20 minutes (20 to 30 if not preheated) the bagels should be thawed and warm.

Remove from the oven, unwrap, slice and eat.

The above technique will get you as close as possible to having a fresh-from-the-baker bagel.

As you can see, though, it might not be ideal for a school morning just because of the amount of time required.

Don't try to speed up thawing with a hotter oven, because that will result in your bagels getting excessively dry and hard.

Question: My kids like their bagels like they just came from the oven or the bagel bakery with a crisp crust and soft chewy center. However, it is not practical to make bagels or buy bagels in the morning on school days. What can I do with a frozen bagel to mimic fresh out of the oven?

How to refresh a frozen bagel

You could defrost them overnight in the fridge before splitting and toasting them in the morning, or put them in the oven for 5-10 minutes at  about 150°C/300°F after brushing or sprinkling water on the outside.

Defrosted bagels can be either toasted or baked in the oven. The oven-baked bagels are more similar to fresh bagels.

The easy way to prepare bagels in the morning is to split and toast them after defrosting overnight.

To get a result closer to a fresh bagel, put them in the oven after splashing them with a little water.


That really wouldn't work.

With steaming the water is heated to boiling which creates steam.

Since the food is colder, the steam condenses on the food which transfers heat to the food.

With hot oil there is no boiling and vapor of the oil.

So in an enclosed container it would be more akin to baking, the hot oil heating the air, than steaming.

(There would be some oil in the vapor above hot oil, but not enough to transfer much heat.)

Another factor here is pointed out by user "Lorel C" in another answer.

Cooking oils tend to decompose and smoke before reaching their boiling point.

If you could get oil to boil without smoking, then "steaming" in the boiling oil vapor would be very close to frying in oil, but at a temperature much above what is normally used.

Also as user "yo" points out in a comment below , the bubbling that you see when frying something isn't the oil boiling.

Rather it is the water coming from the food that is vaporizing.

I have never heard of anyone "steaming" vegetables using oil instead of water.

Placing them in a metal frame above hot oil would not be as effective as cooking them surrounded by steam (from water).

The hot oil would need to be boiling .

According to https://www.researchgate.net/post/What_is_the_boiling_temperature_of_cooking_oil_palm_oil_Any_reference Q & A on cooking oil , "The exact boiling temperature depends on how pure the oil is.

The boiling point for palm cooking oil is estimated in about 300 C (or 572 F).

" That kind of temperature seems like overkill for vegetables.

Also the smoke point for cooking oils is lower than their boiling point, so it would be messy, unpleasant (with all that smoke in the kitchen), and, judging from the comments contributed by others, it would be extremely, crazy -dangerous as well.

As already said, this wouldn't work at all with any normal fat.

I'd further emphasize that it's really quite dangerous:

fat can spontaneously ignite when heated substantially over the smoke point.

And if you drop anything water-containing (like one of the pieces of vegetable) into hot fat, the water will boil with a sudden violent expansion.

When the fat is already aflame, this can result in a literal fiery explosion.

(The reason why fat fires must never be extinguished with water.)

That said, if you use a pure, saturated, short-chain fatty acid like lauric acid , you could get this to work because it chemically withstands the 300°C needed to get it boiling.

These vapours would then indeed “steam” your vegetables.

It would not actually get the vegatables to 300°C because the water content has a high heat capacity; a lot of fatty vapour would need to condense on the surface to even reach 100°C.

I reckon the result would actually be more like soaking the vegs in a cold deep-fryer, which is then heated up slowly.

If you'd do it long enough, the water would eventually evaporate, after which the temperatures would go up much higher – the food would eventually be dry-singed.

Pure lauric acid isn't toxic, but it would probably impose a soapy/waxy taste on the food.

You can, but the oil will smoke before it boils and the oil will require a lot of heat to actually come to a boil.

It's possible, but really really inefficient.

According to that article it would also be dangerous.

Most importantly, from an objective standpoint, you would heat the oil up too much and ruin the flavor.

Your vegetables would not taste good if you did this.

I'm assuming that you're just looking for cool ways to cook stuff at this point.

You should try roasting things with sand or salt.

The youtube channel cookingshooking has a lot of videos where the host cooks things like pizza without an oven using salt in a pressure cooker.

This would cook your vegtables well in a unique way.

If you want your vegtables to be coated in a little bit of oil then you can just sprinkle oil on them or toss them in a bowl with oil to coat them.

Even if you could steam oil without it combusting, it wouldn't transfer nearly as much energy as steam does.

Water has an obscenely high specific heat, just around 4.

Here Oil has a specific heat around 2, depending on the type of oil.

Here, Table 6 it takes approximately one crapload of energy to turn water into steam.

That energy is still in the steam as it rises, and is transferred to anything that it touches.

That is why steam has a such a high scald hazard despite being 'only' 100 C. Oil, with its lower specific heat, would not transfer energy as efficiently.

cooking.stackexchange.com/users/66523/Monica Apologists Get Out

Yes, you can "steam" using oil.

When you steam with water, the hot water condenses on the cold food and transfers the heat.

With oil, you mist the food with oil and then heat the air.

The oil transfers the heat to the food.

It's called "air frying." https://www.buzzfeed.com/michelleno/philips-airfryer-review

You can in fact.

It would not be practical and traditional streaming methods are more precise and less dangerous however, when frying particularly moist foods (like fries) especially in large quantities, steam is produced.

This steam isn't enhanced with flavor and there really isn't any benefit to doing it this way.

Which is probably why it isn't.

Possible to do this safely in an atmosphere without Oxygen, but it would still taste bad.

As other answers mention, the smoke point is lower than the boiling point, so food cooked in oil vapor would taste horrible.

By removing the Oxygen, you won't prevent smoking.

But you will reduce the fire hazard.

One method to do this, and prevent other reactions between the hot oil and the air, would be to remove all the normal air from a room and replace it with a much less reactive Helium.

For obvious reasons, this is not a frequently used cooking method.

When someone does this, it will make a great youtube video.

Perhaps the food will taste good too.

Question: Can you cook some foods just placing them in a metal frame above hot oil? In the same way as steaming vegetables, but with oil. Is that a thing?

Steaming with oil instead of water

This would be possible in theory in a room without oxygen, but in a normal environment the oil would smoke before coming to a boil and would require a lot of heat.

Water is considered the better option for steaming food rather than oil. Oil can, in fact, be used but it is less efficient than water. Using oil in a helium atmosphere may make the practice safer.

It is not possible to steam food using oil instead of water.

It is possible to steam food using oil instead of water but it is less efficient. You could do it in an atmosphere of helium rather than oxygen.


Generally , you should use unsalted butter.

You can always add salt to your unsalted butter, but you can't take it out if you want it less salty!

If it's just being melted on some vegetables, then salted butter is probably fine.

However, different brands of salted butter have different amounts of salt added, which makes it difficult to know how much total salt is going into your food.

This is more problematic in baking.

It's possible to easily oversalt or undersalt just by using a different brand — leading to unpredictable results.

By using unsalted butter, the only salt remaining in the recipe is what you have added, and you have more careful control over the outcome.

If you need to substitute one for another, you can estimate how much salt is in salted butter and adjust your recipe accordingly.

If you are not sure whether a particular recipe calls for salted or unsalted, look for clues.

Is there additional salt in the recipe?

(If not, it may expect some salt from the butter.

If so, it may expect unsalted butter!)

How old is the recipe?

(Newer recipes tend to assume unsalted butter.

Older recipes tend to assume salted butter.)

Where was the recipe written?

Different cultures assume different butters (and salt levels may vary between countries for salted butter!); I will not give an exhaustive list here, mostly because I don't know, but it's worth researching.

If you have the time, interest, and money, you can try making the recipe twice (once with salted, once with unsalted butter) and see which tastes better.

This is a bigger investment, though, so only worth doing if you really want to get the recipe as good as possible.

It does matter, using salted butter changes the salt content of the dish, which will change the flavor.

It probably won't greatly affect the chemistry of a dish aside from that, however.

In my experience it's much more common to see unsalted butter in recipes, so I almost always default to unsalted if the recipe doesn't specify.

If they meant salted butter

and I use unsalted, I can usually fix it by adding salt.

The only real advantage of salted butter is its longer shelf life.

Good question!It depends on the dish being made.

Easy rule of thumb: Savory/seasoned as a main dish or meat = salted butter Sweet, fruit or greens heavy = unsalted Also

- you can make melted/browned butter easily, by slowly melting the butter

so you have a stable cooking medium.

This may be somewhat country-specific.

Here in the UK, sweetness levels which may be considered normal for the US palate are generally considered overkill here.

Using salted butter can provide a balance to the flavour which is missing in unsalted butter.

Adding salt separately can solve that problem, of course.

But with salt levels being relatively consistent in butter over here, and with most people who do use real butter as a spread using salted butter, my experience is that UK recipes are more likely to assume salted butter unless otherwise stated.

In the UK, if a recipe just calls for "butter", it is asking for salted butter.

This is because historically all butter was "salted butter", with "unsalted butter" being very expensive before the advent of refrigeration due to its low shelf life.

Additionally, the majority of products labelled "butter" will be salted butter, with the unsalted butter being explicitly labelled "unsalted butter", e.g. Compare the marketing of major brands in the UK in their use of butter vs unsalted butter: http://www.kerrygold.co.uk/home/products/ https://www.arlafoods.co.uk/brands/butter-and-spreads/

https://www.dairycrest.co.uk/brands/butters-spreads-oils/country-life/ Here is another source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/301909/leading-brands-of-butter-in-the-uk/

What's interesting is that, with the prevalence of internet-based recipes from the US and other English-speaking countries, the term "salted" is now being applied to plain old "butter".

e.g. I remember about 5 years ago Sainsbury's started calling butter "salted butter", which confused my partner at the time as she just wanted "butter", thinking this was an extra salty butter.

Salt and butter have two very different functions.

Using them together does not allow you to control them separately.

For example, if you need more fat but the dish is already salted, you need butter but not salt.

Therefore, if you want to be as accurate as possible, use unsalted butter.

Just a note on all of this - it is not necessarily just about the taste.

A few people have touched on the shelf life, which also makes a difference.

Salted butter is designed to last longer, therefore when doing things like baking - where you want to use the freshest ingredients for a better result - you should always use unsalted, because it will be fresher.

(Especially true when making "challenging" things like pastry).

If it's a recipe for homemade bread they say it's best to use unsalted butter because salt tempers yeast activity, therefore, theoretically, using salted butter would raise salt content (slightly) and possibly lengthen rising time, lessen oven "blooming", and up the finished saltiness of baked bread.

Regardless, I don't find it makes that much difference, for bread baking anyway.

There is no such thing as unsalted butter .

Butter is just made of milk, without salt or any other additive.

If you add salt to it, it becomes salted butter, which is a different thing than butter.

That said, the word "butter" can sometimes refer to salted butter in some countries like the UK.

In countries like France, butter is normally sold unsalted, and salted butter is considered like butter with an additive (salt).

So if the recipe needs butter, just take what is the default in the country of origin of the recipe book.

If you don't know, just take unsalted butter, it's always easier to add salt afterwise than trying to desalt your butter :-).

Question: When recipes call for “butter” but doesn’t specify “salted” or “unsalted”, which should I use? Does it matter?

Should I use salted or unsalted butter if the recipe doesn't specify?

This depends on the dish being served, but while salted butter can add a balance to the flavour, it gives you less control over the amount of salt you are adding. Generally you should use unsalted butter, but in applications like melting butter on vegetables, salted is usually fine.

It is generally considered correct to use unsalted butter in a recipe unless salted is specifically stated. However, this custom may be country-specific. Unsalted butter allows you to control the amount of salt in a dish. Salted butter may be fine in some recipes.

Generally, unsalted butter should be used as it allows the amount of salt in a recipe to be controlled accurately.

Salted butter changes the flavour in a dish.

Using salted or unsalted butter depends on the dish. Salted butter melted on some vegetables is fine.

Using salted and unsalted butter may be country-specific.


Yes, it's true that bananas are radioactive, however, the amount of radiation that you get from eating a banana is negligible.

It's also true that eating too many bananas can kill you, but if you manage to eat enough bananas to get radiation poisoning, you're going to die from something else long before potassium exposure comes into the equation - like, say, the death penalty after murdering the next person to bring a banana within 50 miles of you.

Source https://xkcd.com/radiation/ Bananas are on the left, third from the top.

To better communicate the scale, the top legal (i.e. totally negligible) radiation dose for US workers is equivalent to eating 500,000 bananas/year.

There is actually a unit of radiation exposure measurement called the Banana equivalent dose .

Suffice to say, there are about a thousand other sources of radiation in your day to day life that you should worry about before how many bananas you eat starts to become a real concern.

You can safely eat as many bananas as you please, at least, from a radioactivity standpoint.

In addition to the answers explaining that bananas do contain radioactive potassium, but in small amounts, it's also worth noting that your body maintains a fixed amount of potassium through metabolism .

So even if you somehow manage to consume 5 million bananas, your body won't actually be exposed to 5 million Banana equivalent doses of radiation.

While it's true that bananas are unusually radioactive (which actually means very slightly), you should keep in mind that all plants and animals are radioactive.

For people, about half of our intrinsic radioactivity comes from the potassium in our bodies, and about half from the carbon-14 which we all carry around.

As for safe quantities, that's pretty simple: about 4 liters (9 pounds or so).

But this has nothing to do with radioactivity - it's the approximate maximum capacity of the normal human stomach.

Eating more than this runs the risk of tearing the stomach and dying.

The question of banana radioactivity has sparked the creation of the Banana Equivalent Dose of radiation.

It's about 0.1 μSievert.

Since it takes about 5 to 7 Sieverts to kill an adult human, the lethal dose (radiation) for bananas is something like 50 million bananas.

And it's even harder to kill somebody that way than that rather silly number suggests.

The body has a fairly comprehensive and efficient set of mechanisms for keeping things in balance, and excess potassium is typically excreted within 24 hours.

Although, admittedly, the changes needed to support the ingestion of 50 million bananas would almost certainly cause other changes in the (formerly) human body, and any discussion of associated effects become pure speculation.

Yes, bananas are radioactive .

They contain potassium, and a small part of this comes as a radioactive isotope 40 K.

The dose of an average banana is (rounded up) around 0.1 μSv.

Other potassium-rich foods also naturally contain 40 K, e.g. potatoes.

There is absolutely nothing to worry about.

Our natural environment and cosmic radiation means our bodies are constantly exposed to radioactive material, but just in trace amounts.

If you were to somehow actually take all that radioactivity into your body you would be dead long before the radioactivity became an issue.

The radioactive element is potassium--and potassium chloride is used as an execution drug.

In practice your body maintains potassium levels at the right amount (too little is also deadly), eating more bananas simply means more potassium in your urine.

Besides, I have a jar sitting here next to me.

It's far more radioactive than a banana.

It's meant as food, though:

When people compare the radiation received from other sources with the radiation from eating a banana, the point of the exercise is not to say that eating bananas is risky.

It’s to say that the radiation level you’re exposed to from from things like nuclear power is safe, and you shouldn’t worry about it (or about eating bananas).

Yes, but it's extremely small.

Bananas do have a very small amount of radioactivity, but as showed by the chart linked in another answer, it's a really small amount, compared to the amount you are exposed to by being around everyday items/doing everyday activities.

You would need to eat several million bananas in a short time span to actually suffer ill effects/

die, which we all know is basically impossible.

The bananas would've probably killed you some other way.

Basically, don't worry.

Well, yes to both, up to a point.

All things are radioactive - radioactive isotopes occur in minute concentrations in nature, so stones, trees, water, air, and indeed fruits are radioactive, and it can be measured too, but only because our instruments are very sensitive.

Life has evolved in this environment for ~4 billion years, and it is clearly not enough to harm us.

As for the second question - if you will forgive the tongue-in-cheek answer - anything will kill you if you eat too much; that could be concidered the definition of 'too much'.

But I think you will have to eat an incredible number of bananas, and it won't be the radiation that kills you, but the overeating.

Question: Is it true that bananas are radioactive, and if you eat too many it can kill you? If yes then how many bananas are good to eat at once.

Is it true that bananas are radioactive?

Like all plants and animals, bananas are radioactive, but this level is so low that it would take millions of bananas to kill you.

Bananas are slightly radioactibe but they are safe to eat as you would need to eat 50 million to suffer adverse effects from radiation.

Bananas are slightly radioactive but they are safe to eat.

All plants and animals are radioactive and the amount of bananas you need to eat to suffer ill effects is 50 million. Death from overeating would come first.


I find that a silicone spatula is frequently better at getting the pan clean than a stiff spatula like a wooden one.

If your rice is slightly burnt into the bottom, you might have to use both - scratch it off with the wooden spatula, then collect with the silicone one.

Other things you can try: add a tablespoon more water at the start reduce the cook-time by 2 minutes let the rice sit for a minute or two with the lid on, sort of "steaming in its own juices" The idea is that if the rice is just a bit damp, it won't stick.

Try putting a spoon of fat (oil, butter, etc) in the beginning... it will melt and coat the rice/bottom of the pan.

I used to always have some rice stuck to the bottom of my pan when I moved into my new home with gas stoves instead of electric.

This trick works very well, and now my rice all comes out of the pan clean and easily.

When making sticky-rice

I use a rice cooker with a non-stick surface on the inner pot.

This works tremendously effectively.

If you are using a frying pan with a non-stick surface then my immediate reaction would be that the contact point heat is too high.

My second reaction would be to make sure you were rinsing your rice before cooking it (this helps with the extreme stickiness issue)

Cook it in the microwave.

It never sticks because the heat is applied evenly throughout.

Place one cup of rice with one cup of boiling water in a glass bowl with a tablespoon of oil.

Heat on full power for 6 minutes.

Stir the rice, add another cup of boiling water and heat for another 6 minutes.

Then fluff it up once finished.

Once you cook it this way you will never go back.

I guess it depends on what you expect from your rice, but my recipe is this: Heat up a pot with some (not too much) oil until the oil is quite hot. Put some volume of rice into it, and vigorously scrape/mix it with whatever large implement you have around (big spatula).

Smell it a lot.

At some point the rice will start to roast (ever so slightly), it may smell like nuts or something like that.

As soon as that smell changes, put in two volumes of cold water.

Let it get to boiling and immediately lower the temperature until it stays at an almost-boil.

Stir occasionally (like every few minutes).

Let it cook until the water is about gone.

For whatever reason, the rice never sticks, at least not more than can easily be swooshed off with a spatula (without any force, without getting any black burned residue).

I usually do that in stainless steel pots (very smooth surfaces).

Occasionally I do it in a big wok with a noticeably rough surface, and there it works the same.

So it should also work in a pan.

I have not tried it in my cast iron pan.

I'm going to go contra to pretty much all the advice so far, but this is how I've been cooking rice for 25 years...

Clear-lidded pans make this far less guesswork.

Don't use a frying pan, use a heavy-bottomed saucepan with a tight-fitting lid, 3 times the volume of your finished rice.

Don't rinse the rice, you don't need to.

Use your coolest, most even burner - this is not necessarily the smallest.

Sometimes the tiny ones generate bad hot-spots that a medium one wouldn't.

Boil the kettle.

Pre-heat the pan on high.

Add rice to your pre-heated pan.

Salt as required.

Immediately add 1.75 x the volume of water, not double.

That should immediately hit a rapid boil because of the pre-heating.

Stir once, just enough to ensure the grains are separated.

Drop the heat to minimum [on gas

this is near instantaneous, you might need to wait a second on electric]

Put the lid on.

The contents should foam almost to the top but not go over - lift & replace the lid if it looks like it will go over, otherwise leave alone.

Simmer at this minimum temperature for 12-15 mins [depends how low you can get the heat]

Don't lift the lid to "see if it's done".

Learn when it's done by repetition. '

When it's done' btw, is when all the water is gone; you might be able to hear a slight crackle as the last bit dries.

After the required time, switch off the heat, leave the lid on.

Allow to rest for another 15-20 minutes.

Fluff briefly with your spatula; no great effort should be required at this stage.

Serve.

The rice will be separate & fluffy, none will be stuck to the bottom.

This works for pretty much any rice type - long grain, basmati, or short-grain, glutinous [short grain, of course, will not separate in the same way].

I agree with the suggestion of adding a very small amount of oil.

I pay attention to the taste and freshness of the oil I use, however small the amount, it influences the taste of the result.

Sticking rice usually happens because of a very high cooking temperature.

Your pot should be slightly boiling with the cap closed.

Let it cool and it won't stick, then you can scrape it out with a spatula rather easily.

Do what sushi chefs do when cooking rice, which is to use something like cheese cloth inside the cooking pot.

I bought one specifically made for rice, it's big enough to fit inside the pot folded over the rice and the water.

AS the rice cooks and the water boils away, the net catches all the rice.

When the rice is cooked you grab the ends of the netting and pull the whole thing out of the pot.

voila, all the rice in the net.

Question: Often when cooking rice a lot of it ends up sticking to the bottom of the pan and gets wasted. I'm using a frying pan with a non-stick surface. Is there a way to get all the rice out of the pan easily?

How to get all the rice out of the pan?

Use a large, heavy-bottomed saucepan on your coolest, most even burner, and add a tablespoon more water or some fat at the start. When the rice is done, let it cool and then remove with a silicone spatula. Other options include not rinsing the rice before cooking, placing the rice in something like cheesecloth in the pot or cooking the rice in the microwave.

Several tips can help prevent rice sticking. These include adding oil or fat, cooking on the lowest heat and leaving the rice to stand when cooking is finished. Moreover, a frying pan should not be used and the rice should not be rinsed. However, there are some othe cooking methods to avoid the problem, such as the microwave and cooking the rice in a cheesecloth.

There are several tips for preventing rice sticking to the pan. These include scraping with a spatula, adding oil or fat, cooking on the coolest heat and allowing to stand after switching off the heat.

To prevent rice sticking do not use a frying pan and do not rinse the rice.

Use alternative cooking methods such as the microwave or a cheese cloths as sushi chefs do.


There are several terms which you can use, depending on the context of writing (or speaking).

A very simple one is "the starch".

It is mostly used in the context of meal planning, such as "What starch are we going to serve tonight" or "When planning a vegetarian meal, it is best to first decide on the starch and then select sides that complement it".

"Grains" or, mostly interchangeably, "cereals" is what academic specialists for nutrition and diets use in their jargon.

If you read a textbook on nutrition, that's where you will find breads, etc.

There, the context makes it clear that the word doesn't mean simply uncooked kernels.

The nonacademic literature on dieting is more likely to use "carbs" - see Chris H's answer for more detail on that usage.

In legal language, for example rules and regulations about food product labelling, or import and export regulations, you will frequently find phrases like "grain products".

Since none of these terms is unambiguous, outside of these genres of writing you will probably have to go for something more descriptive, for example "foods made from grains" in a colloquial conversation.

A broader category, including things like potatoes, would be carbs (carbohydrates).

This is a common category when considering feeding for exercise, and tends to mean starchy foods.

It's not a perfect term as "carbs" strictly includes sugars, but the carb component of a meal is the (usually fairly plain) bulk accompaniment to the tasty bits.

Since all of those, specifically (even the bread) are derived from cereal grains, they are generally referred to as "grains."

Any food made from wheat, rice, oats, cornmeal, barley or another cereal grain is a grain product.

Bread, pasta, oatmeal, breakfast cereals, tortillas, and grits are examples of grain products.

Grains are divided into 2 subgroups, Whole Grains and Refined Grains.

Whole grains contain the entire grain kernel ― the bran, germ, and endosperm.

Examples of whole grains include whole-wheat flour, bulgur (cracked wheat), oatmeal, whole cornmeal, and brown rice.

Refined grains have been milled, a process that removes the bran and germ.

This is done to give grains a finer texture and improve their shelf life, but it also removes dietary fiber, iron, and many B vitamins.

Some examples of refined grain products are white flour, de-germed cornmeal, white bread, and white rice.

US Department of Agriculture: What Foods Are In the Grains Group?

Starch

I've heard it called the Rule of Three - protein, starch, vegetable.

The first thing that came to my mind is that these are "staple foods."

In other words, and especially for what you specifically mention, these foods constitute the basis of diet for a group of people.

Of course, they're also starches, carbs, sugars, etc.

The term "grains" is commonly used to referred to the 'processed' food as well as the 'unprocessed thing'.

People often refer to 'eating grains', and they very rarely mean the unprocessed seeds.

I've also seen 'grain foods' used where there might be confusion.

The term " farinaceous " might be appropriate, especially when used as " farinaceous dishes " that include other ingredients.

The corresponding noun " farina " isn't quite equivalent.

"Farinaceous" seems to be rare now but was more common in the 1800s .

The examples you've given are all from the grass family and they're examples of cereals.

But if you included peas and beans, those are legumes or pulses.

But if you also included say potatoes then these are often called carbs.

It's unclear which way you want to categorise.

If you want to reference the main bulk of some meal which a previous answer has called the carbs, I often call this the filler of a meal.

The term carbs can't really legitimately be used e.g. if your filler is a pulse such as kidney beans which has a high protein content so isn't just carbs.

Again, bread is a filler but contains protein, carbs and a bit of fat.

Or you have say dumplings which are another filler, this time often with a relatively high fat content.

Question: I'm not sure if this belongs here or in the English language stack exchange but here goes:   We have broad classifications like "Fruit" and "Vegetable" and "Meat"/"Protein". What do you collectively call bread, rice, pasta, cereal etc. My first guess was "Grains" but that feels like referring to the unprocessed thing rather than the food.

What are things like Bread, Rice and Cereal collectively known as?

Since these all come from the grass family, they are commonly called grains, cereals or sometimes farinaceous products. They can also be referred to as starches, staples or carbohydrates.

Starch, grains or cereals are the terms considered by most people to apply to bread, rice and cereals. Other terms include carbs, staple foods and farinaceous foods. In legal language, they are known as grain products.

Starch, cereals and grains is the term usually applied to the food group that includes bread, rice and cereals.

Other names for this food group include staples, carbs and farinaceous.

In legal language bread, rice and cereals are known as grain products.


If an egg is already cracked then it will almost certainly split open when boiled, there's no way to avoid it, it would be best to cook them using another method.

Be aware that once eggs are cracked they no longer have protection against microbes, if you don't know how long they have been cracked it may be best to throw them away.

I use Egglettes ™ to boil my eggs.

You simply crack the egg/s into a silicone cup and place it/them into boiling water.

Without wishing to seem like a crappy infomercial (see below), I find it a heck of a lot easier to crack an egg into a cup than I find it to peel eggshells off of a soft-boiled egg.

Obviously it makes no difference if the egg has already sustained a recent crack (from being dropped onto the surface, for example) since you're removing the shell prior to cooking.

For the avoidance of doubt, I am in no way affiliated to Egglettes other than being a customer

Adding salt in the water helps as well.

There are multiple theories on why this works.

Osmosis direction

The egg white will become solid when getting in contact with the salt water and basically it will close the crack again.

Boiling point difference

You can choose to poach the egg.

The egg is cracked into a cup or bowl of any size, and then gently slid into a pan of water at approximately 75 Celsius (167 °F) and cooked until the egg white has mostly solidified, but the yolk remains soft.

The "perfect" poached egg has a runny yolk, with a hardening crust and no raw white remaining.

I don't have any experience with this

but I would imagine you could cook it until the yolk hardens along with the whites.

You can boil cracked egg safely just use 2 table spoons of white vinegar.

Put White vinegar in boiling water and then gently put the egg in the water and let it boil.

Egg will not come out of its shell.

You can also make egg poach.

Click here to understand about egg poach

Believe it or not, you can put some Duct Tape (like gaffer tape - heavy tape) over the crack, and away you go.

(I'm not sure why anyone would bother with this - boiled eggs which have some white "poking out" are fine -

but there you have it.)

It's possible to boil an egg with steam.

This usually requires an additional device.

The eggs are put upright and won't split open since they are not exposed directly to the hot water.

If the egg's been cracked for a while, just throw it out.

Even though the boiling process should kill anything growing in it, good sense says it's not worth the risk.

If the egg gets small cracks when you put it in the water or while cooking, it's perfectly fine.

In my experience, the heat will quickly make the outer layer of white solidify as it cooks, which will lock everything else inside, crack or no.

The worst I've ever seen happen from cooking an egg that cracked early on is that little bits of white escape and get cooked in the water, giving it a cloudy look.

I've eaten many eggs that cracked while cooking and never had any problems.

You can "steam" the egg instead.

use a separator/sieve to suspend the egg above the boiling water in the pan.

It will take longer than boiling to completely cook the egg.

Question: If we boil an egg which already has a crack on its shell before boiling, it will break and spread into the water. In many cases if we put an egg into hot water it will crack also. So, is there any safe method to boil an egg like that, or should it be fried or cooked in another way?

Is there any method to boil a cracked egg without making a mess?

If an egg has been cracked for a while, it may not be safe and should be thrown out. Otherwise you can add vinegar or salt to the water, use another method like steaming or poaching or use Egglettes to cook the eggs.

If an egg has been cracked for some time, throwing it away is considered sensible. However, you can boil a cracked egg by adding salt or vinegar to the water, applying Duct Tape to the crack or boiling the egg in Egglettes ™. Alternatively, a different cooking method can be used, like poaching or steaming.

If an egg is cracked it is better to choose a different cooking method and not boiling. Poaching or steaming are possible cooking methods.

If you wish to boil a cracked egg use one of the folloiwng tips: add salt or vinegar to the cooking water, use Egglettes ™ to cook the egg or place Duct Tape over the crack.

It is better to throw away an egg that has been cracked for some time.


It's possible to get specialized equipment for this: a plunger measuring cup.

The base is adjusted to the level you need to measure, the sticky honey or syrup is poured in, and then the cup is upended and as the base is pushed in, it scrapes the sides as it travels.

I'd only invest in this if you very frequently measure sticky ingredients

-- it's not strictly necessary, but it can be a timesaver for some recipes.

It's available from many different brands.

As, since this answer other suggestions have abounded, let me clarify.

These methods assume you want no wastage & also no cross-contamination of your source jar of the sticky component.

They also require almost nothing in the way of 'extra equipment'.

Depending on what the next steps to your recipe are, I can think of three alternatives.

None are perfect and each would suit a different scenario.

Tip it and leave it a long time.

Heat it slightly.

Microwave or sit the container in hot water. or my favourite, Rinse it out with the next liquid ingredient

you will use in the same recipe; or for a spoon, stir your existing ingredients with it.

Your concern is NOT getting the measuring item clean.

Your concern is ensuring the right amount of ingredient goes where it is desired.

If you have decent accuracy digital kitchen scales (relatively cheap usually but may depend on your location), you can measure by weight.

If you need to determine the weight by measure of your sticky substance, start with these steps: Place the measuring item (spoon, cup whatever) on the scales.

Tare the scales to zero.

Scoop quantity of sticky substance.

Measure on scales, and note the number.

Once you know how much the desired measurement should weigh (you can also look up these numbers online or in many cookbooks): Place destination bowl on scales and tare to zero.

Add sticky substance up to the desired weight.

What I do, if the recipe calls for any sort of oil, measure that first, then the honey slides out pretty well.

It's not a perfect solution, but using two spoons and scraping one with the other you can get the majority of the syrup off the spoons relatively quickly.

Silicone spatulas are quite good at cleaning hard vessels well.

Combine that with a small enough measurement - so don't measure 50 ml of honey in a 1000 ml cup, use as close to 50 ml as this gives you a better ratio of volume-to-wall-surface - then scrape with the silicone spatula, and it will be almost as clean as licked. For getting the cup clean afterwards, wash with hot water, not merely warm.

Heat the utensil.

For a spoon, fill a coffee cup with boiling water, and drop the spoon in there for 30 secs or so, or for a measuring cup, just fill it with boiling water before measuring out the honey/syrup.

The heat will reduce the viscosity making it pour off the spoon/out of the cup better.

I've found that a light spray of cooking spray on the spoon or in a measuring cup will make measuring any sticky substance very easy.

Rub a tiny amount of neutral oil onto the measuring cup prior to measuring.

Why not put the honey pot on the balance instead and take your measures at reverse?

That's what I do.

Convert all measures to CC's and then use syringes.

Different syringe for each ingredient.

Minimizes waste, and they come sterile.

Water on your spoon will help, I found that when I put peanut butter into my drink in the morning and used a wet spoon from the draining board that it is considerably less sticky.

In the case of honey or syrup, buy a squeezy bottle, and measure out the amount by placing the receptical on a balance and squeezing until enough comes out.

The bottle can be rinsed out and used again and again.

I also buy glass jars of honey (much cheaper than squeezy), and decant that into the squeezy bottle.

Question: When I put honey in a spoon or measuring cup, the residue stays and it’s hard to get all of it out. How do I make it all come out? Is there a way to measure honey without leaving honey on a spoon?

How do I get something sticky like honey or Golden Syrup off measuring spoons or measuring cups? Is there a better way?

If the recipe calls for oil, measure this first or coat the spoon with oil or cooking spray. Heating the spoon or coating it in water can also help.You can also use a second spoon or a spatula, or convert to CCs and use a syringe.

There are various ways to get sticky ingredients out of a container. It can be scraped out using two spoons or a spatula or you can put some oil or water into the container first so the sticky substances comes out easier. However, it is also possible to avoid the problem all together by using syringes for measuring sticky substances.

Use syringes for measuring sticky substances.


You can pretty much substitute coffee with roasted grain coffee-like powder of any brand you like.

It works as a drop-in replacement in drinks and foods really well.

After all, coffee is just a roasted grain, too.

If you need instant coffee, one that dissolve in water or baked goods, I know for a fact that Inka brand makes instant roasted grain "coffee" that can be used as substitute.

I don't know about other brands quality, but you can try ones found on Amazon .

I personally prefer ones with sugar beet and chicory, some brands also use dandelion.

Additions are there to emulate coffee better, to make taste more rich and complicated.

Basically, if it tastes good and is bitterish enough, it'll work.

I'm not affiliated with linked sellers.

It is just an example.

If it's primarily a chocolate recipe the coffee is there to add flavour.

You may be able to simply omit it.

I would generally replace it with the same quantitity of (unsweetened) cocoa powder as otherwise the recipe may be a little too sweet.

If you find the overall recipe lacking in flavour after that, try more cocoa or adding a tiny bit of a compatible flavour, for a different but still good effect.

One thing that works well with chocolate is vanilla, another is ginger (though too much and it will dominate - good, but not what you asked for).

If the espresso powder is dissolved in liquid before adding, you can use liquid extracts to replace some of the liquid (but be careful what you buy if you also avoid alcohol as many who avoid coffee do).

This gives you slightly more choice, as you can use a little almond extract, or even mint, or replace the liquid with orange juice.

Of the flavours I mentioned, the almond and the vanilla would be best for just adding a subtle bit more flavour, while the others are conventionally used with chocolate in some recipes and ould go well, though change the end result.

If the recipe is a mocha recipe, or there's a lot of coffee in there, I suggest looking for a similar recipe with no or less coffee.

This is always an option.

It won't be coffee flavored (maybe that's not a bad thing), but what about ground black cardamom?

I have yet to try it (I am ordering it shortly), but Alton Brown has updated some of his old recipes.

His updated chocolate syrup uses black cardamom to enhance the coffee syrup.

From his description in the episode, it sounds like more of an herbal compliment, unlike espresso powder's enhancement of the bitter flavors.

See new recipe here .

I fully plan on playing around with black cardamom and chocolate.

Chaga mushroom powder has a similar flavor profile to a lot of coffees and is also super good for you.

Coffee is a roasted cherry pit, not a grain, so I'd avoid those.

There are a lot of acidic and tannic qualities in brewed coffee, so even a black tea powder may work well!

Like another poster said, it's really just to add depth of flavor to the chocolate.

Barley Cup was the go-to instant coffee substitute back in the day - roasted cereal and chicory in an easy-to-use powder.

Artificial coffee flavour seems like the right solution for your problem.

Question: I see Espresso Powder frequently in chocolate-based baking recipes. I've done some searching here (and elsewhere online) for potential substitutes, but have only been able to find other coffee-based substitutions.  For  religious reasons  I would like to avoid coffee products. To clarify - caffeine is not the issue, but rather the coffee bean itself.  What are some effective substitutes for espresso powder in chocolate-based baking recipes (e.g. brownies) that do not contain the coffee bean?

Please suggest a substitute for espresso powder which is not made from coffee

You can substitute coffee with different kinds of roasted grain powders such as Barley Cup or artificial coffee flavour, omit it and add more cocoa powder or use a different flavour like ground black cardamom or Chaga mushroom powder.

Coffee is not a grain but it is often replaced by roasted grains in cooking. Other options to be considered are black cardamom, black tea, chaga mushroom powder and artificial coffee flavour. In some recipes, on the other hand, it may be possible to omit it altogether and replace with extra cocoa.

Roasted grains are considered a good substitute for expresson powder. However, coffee is not a grain so the taste may not be similar.

Expresso powder can be omitted in most recipes or additional cocoa can be added in chocolate recipes.

Other alternatives to coffee powder include black cardamom, chaga mushroom powder, black tea and artifical coffee flavouring.