Is spending three hours preparing supper your ideal Sunday evening? Or ordering-in some pizza while you lounge on the couch sound more like it? Well, whichever way you sway, we’ve got you covered. Whether the kitchen is your siamese twin or a third cousin once removed, we have the top four hacks that make your culinary adventures effortless. These quick tricks will not only speed up your kitchen journey but have your F&F wonder “how does (s)he do it?”. #DSSCRecommends these 4 hacks to help you sail through to your crown of being king o’ the kitchen.
Keep ‘em herbs fresh
Image: simplyrecipes.com
‘Fresh herbs’ should be fresh, duh. But how often do the fresh-as-a-daisy herbs you bring home go dry, limp, or wilt sooner than their time. It’s time to say goodbye to those herbs wilting with this ace hack, and keep them crisp, crunchy, and flavourful for up to two weeks.
- Avoid rinsing the herbs when storing, do so only when you’re about to use them.
- Partially fill a glass jar with water.
- Cut off the bottom portion of the stems, and place the stem ends of the herbs in the jar.
- Now, either seal the jar lid or cover the herbs with a plastic bag, using a rubber band to hold it in place.
- Store in the refrigerator.
N.B.: When storing basil, keep the jar at room temperature.
Keep your cookies oven-fresh forever
The aroma of freshly baked cookies is what olfactory dreams are made of. While the rule of thumb is ‘no one can stop at one’, sometimes we deviate from the cookie cutter path and save these baked gems to chomp on later. However, we often wake up with a jolt from this dream when the our stock of cookies goes dry and brittle. What gives, you ask? This neat little trick does, we say! Instead of stacking up your cookies in glass jars, take a plastic container, add an apple wedge to it and put in the cookies. Voila! Now you shall have oven-fresh cookies for days, as they take in the moisture from the apple wedge to stay moist & soft as ever.
N.B.: You can change the apple wedge with a fresh one as and when required.
Give your grains a umami boost
Image: Jennifer Causey
Key players in dishes across the world, grains often don’t garner the attention they deserve. However, it’s now time for grains to stop being the wallflower and become the white lily of your supper table. Give your rice, quinoa, millet, and more a makeover, making them go from silent spectator to showman with this quick ’n’ easy cooking hack. Next time you’re prepping any of these grains, add a teabag into the pot when you’re boiling these, leave it in for 2 to 3 minutes and enjoy that extra zing of flavour. Lapsang souchong black tea, earl grey, matcha green tea, and your everyday Indian tea are your go-to options for this swap-up.
Keep your wine cool in it’s glass without diluting it
Image: doyoubake.com
Wine and cheese platter. Pasta and vino. Cabernet Sauvignon with lamb chops. Wine and a glass. We only need an excuse to pop open yet another bottle of the drink of the Gods. If you’re anything like us, your bottles run out faster than your 750m morning sprint, making it a tad difficult to have the perfect temperature for each glass that you pour. And even when you plan plan, stock stock, our Indian temperatures don’t allow that pour to stay nice and cold till the time you reach the bottom.
So here’s quick-fix for taking you out of this not-so-chill fix. Store a few grapes in the freezer, and when you need to cool down a glass of wine just toss a grape into the drink. As the grapes won’t cool too quickly or water down the drink, they’re a great alternative to ice cubes. The darker grapes work better with red wine while the lighter ones pair up well with white wine, however, they don’t impart much taste to the wine hence you can interchange the grapes.
Go ahead, chop, grill, sauté, braise – these hacks have cleared out your schedule to make time for your kitchen experiments!
Featured Image Courtesy: tipsforsurvivalists.com
