- Squeak them.
- Cover it.
- Toss it into a blender.
- Swirl it.
- I put it on rice.
- Run cold water through it.
- And just grate it.
- Just the tips.
- [Man] Just the tips here we go.
[upbeat percussion music]
[upbeat percussion music]
- I love them.
A tricky way to know when they are ready.
Gotta squeak them.
You do a squeaky sound.
[artichoke squeaking]
Yeah.
I encounter so many
people that they never...
- It's very...
- Try to cook.
- It's very intimidating.
- Right it's intimidating
but it's not that hard.
It's so good to eat it it's full of--
- You can steam them whole.
- Steam them whole.
- Peel the leaves off.
- With olive oil, lemon,
something like that.
Yeah, what's not to like.
[upbeat percussion music]
- Beans!
The way that I like to
cook beans is in the oven.
- I know that's interesting.
- It's my favey-fave way.
Dutch oven.
You've got your beans, these
have been soaking overnight.
These are pinto beans.
The reason that I like
cooking beans in the oven,
is it cooks them a lot more
gently and more evenly I think
than they would if you're
putting them on the stove top.
Covering them with fresh water,
not using that you use to soak them with.
I like to salt right
from the very beginning
and then I like to add some aromatics.
Dried mushrooms, a couple of chilis.
I like a little bit of charred onion.
Kombu which is seaweed.
A little bit of olive oil.
I would bring this up to
a boil on the stove top,
cover it and then park it
in like a 300 degree oven
and for like an hour
to an hour and a half.
I think this is the best way to get it.
- You just sold me.
- Yup.
[upbeat percussion music]
- Corn.
- Corn.
- This is what corn looks like.
- Oh.
The best way to cut the
kernels off the cob,
without them scattering everywhere,
is to put it inside of
a pretty shallow bowl
and then just cut down along the cob
and they will all just fall
and release into the bowl.
And then the next thing
that I wanted to talk about
was the corn milk.
Which is this milky, creamy
liquid that is in the cob
and shouldn't be left behind.
Take the back of your
knife, so the dull side,
and scrape down the cob and
it will release into the bowl.
And this is great if you're
making something like a chowder
which is already gonna be creamy
and there's a lot of flavor
in the corn milk so why waste
it and why leave it behind?
[upbeat percussion music]
- I personally believe you can
turn any herb into a chutney.
Toss it into a blender
with juice of one lime,
a serrano chili, salt, sugar.
You can do one herb, you can
do multiple types of herb.
Boom, Instant Chutney.
A chutney is basically
just like a herby spicy
accompaniment to a lot of Indian dishes
but I like using it as a dip.
Serving with crudites,
serving with crackers.
Spreading it on bread, using
it as a sandwich spread.
- Put it on your fish.
- Put it on your fish, yes a dressing.
[upbeat percussion music]
- An emulsion, it's the
stable dispersal of one thing
into another with which
it would not normally mix.
So that could mean like oil
and vinegar in a salad dressing
or it can mean like an emulsion of sauce
and at the very root of it
I just want to show you...
So like in one case I'm
breaking the emulsion
that is present in the
butter by just melting it.
Okay, so I'm basically when I melt it
and I start to sizzle it,
when you hear that sizzle
that's the water content of
the butter which is around,
lets call it, 20% comes
sizzling out of the butter.
Whereas if I take the same
amount of butter and swirl it.
Basically that preserves the
constant state of the butter
which is to be emulsified.
It's like this is a secret
to a lot of french sauces and what not.
So this has preserved the
creamy characteristics
of the butter, whereas
this from this point
basically would be...
You could build it up with
a little bit more butter
but it's effectively separated.
[upbeat percussion music]
- Furikake--
- [Japanese Woman] Furikake.
- Just a great seasoning, Japanese.
It's usually got some
seaweed, sesame seed,
sometimes it's dried fish in it.
It's great just on, I put it on rice.
Or you can put it on your chicken,
put it in sauces and marinades.
Just an awesome awesome
thing to have in your pantry.
Easy to find for the most part.
This one you can even get at Whole Foods
and they're great so...
Furikake.
[upbeat percussion music]
- I feel like there's a few different ways
that we've agreed on in the Test Kitchen
to break down garlic.
The first one would be
to cut it cross ways
and to expose the cloves
and then we tend to break down our garlic
into a very almost paste-like
with a Microplane, or a mortar
and pestle if you're like me,
and that just makes for a
more concentrated flavor.
Just remember that the further
you breakdown the garlic,
the more concentrated the flavor will be.
[upbeat percussion music]
- This is fresh horseradish.
I love the flavor fresh, it's more subtle,
it's still hot and spicy but
it's not gonna have that same
kinda nose tingling wasabi
effect when it's fresh.
It's just more mild.
It's really nice over braised dishes,
you can grate some into a mayonnaise
or a creamy dip, I like it in dressings.
And then use a Microplane...
And just grate it.
I'm sorry.
- So...
Ice.
You can never have enough ice.
And that's kind of--
- In your life.
- In your life.
- Oh my God that's the truest truth.
- If you make cocktails,
if you drink wine.
- If you drink water.
You better drink water.
It's really important.
I personally like to keep a
whole bag of grocery store ice
in my freezer at all times
because you're never gonna
have enough ice at the ready
as you do if you just have
a stash of bagged ice.
[upbeat percussion music]
- So I just wanted to show you
my all time favorite citrus juicer.
Not only does it juice the
citrus and collect the seeds,
but it will measure the juice for you
by tablespoons or by ounces.
- Oh!
- If you get you know?
- Oh my God, the amount
of juice is insane.
- I think it's the highest yield
and the cleanest way to--
- And I like this better
than using a handheld reamer.
- Yeah.
- Because, yeah.
You just really, yeah, wow.
- That's also messy.
And then what did we get there?
- 50 milliliters of lemon juice.
- Or 1.75 ounces or three
and a half tablespoons.
- Wherever you live in the world,
you can understand this thing.
[glass sliding]
[yelps]
Oh sorry.
[upbeat percussion music]
- All right kitchen twine.
This is a thing that
when you don't have it
and you need it nothing really compares.
Twine's great to have around for
when you need to make a
little roulade for braciole.
But it's also great if you're
making a pot of beans or stock
and you want to add herbs to them
but don't want to have to deal
with fishing them out later.
You can just make your
little bundle and tie 'em up.
And drop 'em into the stock
and pull 'em out without having to drain
and pick them out later.
You've got time for thyme,
you've got time for twine.
[laughing]
[upbeat percussion music]
So like lemongrass, it's incredibly tough,
It's incredibly fibrous.
So when you're prepping it,
always take the outer
layers of very woody,
kind of dried out leaves off of it.
You can grate it on a Microplane grater
- Microplane, yeah.
- You know, to like grate
it right into a sauce.
And if you wanna just blend
it straight into something,
you can slice it thin, even though
it seems really hard and tough,
just slicing it really thin,
this will blend totally
easily in a blender.
Get it outta here.
[upbeat percussion music]
- So, flyin' in.
Yeah a mandoline, you wanna
be careful with this one
with your fingers, you always
wanna cut with an open hand.
But this is a great way if
you gotta cut a lot of things
real thin consistently.
Just a great tool to have in the kitchen.
You just kinda.
[mandoline thumping on plate]
- Boom.
Delicious.
- And you can easily do
that with a knife too,
- I mean not really, I
feel like you can't--
- Well it depends who you ask Priya.
[upbeat percussion music]
- I like to cook my nuts in fat.
So these are pecans that are cooked
in a little bit of butter
but you could also cook them in olive oil,
you can cook them in a neutral oil.
I just love what happens.
The nuts when they're toasted in a fat,
they almost amplify in their flavor.
- Nuts for nuts.
- Nuts for nuts.
[upbeat percussion music]
- Okay, olive oil.
The only olive oil that
you should be using
is extra virgin olive oil.
Okay so that's number one.
And I learned recently to buy olive oil
in smaller bottles than you think.
You don't want a three liter
can of olive oil hanging out
because it oxidizes and changes flavor
an can go rancid very quickly.
Always buy an olive oil
that's in a dark green
or a black bottle, something
that light cannot pass through
because light will also
oxidize and change the flavor
and you want to be able to
see from looking at the label
you want to know the country of origin,
you wanna see the words extra virgin,
and to get an idea of
when it was harvested.
There should be a stamp on the back.
So just use one that you like,
the flavor varies, its kinda like wine.
So...
Mmm.
- Yeah it's good?
- It's also great for your skin and hair.
[upbeat percussion music]
- P, it's for pork.
Stop overcooking it.
The reason that a lot of
people don't like the pork
that they make at home is
that they're overcooking it.
They that that you need to
cook it to like 160 degrees
in order for it to be safe
to eat, that's not the case.
135 for like a thick cut pork chop
and then let it carryover
to that 140 place.
It's gonna be nice and rosy
inside, don't freak out,
it's gonna be the juiciest
pork chop that you ever have
in your entire life so.
- You should be eating
your pork at medium.
- Yeah, medium
- Not medium well.
[metal sliding]
Sorry, not sorry.
[upbeat percussion music]
'Kay quinoa has a coating on
the outside called saponin?
- Ooh.
- Saponin?
I don't know how you pronounce it.
- [Electronic Woman] Saponin.
- And it's very bitter and
so that's why we rinse quinoa
before we cook it.
So the best way to deal with
it is to put your dry quinoa
into a fine mesh strainer and
then run cold water through it
using your fingers to swoosh it around,
until the water runs clear,
much like you would with rice
and this will...
- Okay.
- wash away any of that bitterness.
We're getting a really wacky
pile of shit over there.
- Ah, rhizomes. [laughing]
Rhizomes are not roots
and this is fresh tumeric and this ginger.
The rhizome is actually
an underground plant stem.
So whereas a carrot is a root vegetable
where the vegetable's growing underground,
a rhizome is a stem that grows underground
and sends off other shoots.
I like to use a spoon to peel.
You can also use a peeler for this
but the spoon lets you kinda get around
the little nodes and things.
And the same is true for the
tumeric which just doing this
will probably stay in my fingers
but it's totally worth it.
[upbeat percussion music]
- So the old salt and squeeze is this.
- Basically things like
cucumbers even summer squashes,
things kind of in that
family are full of water.
And a great way to kind of start
to get rid of some of that
water, concentrate the flavor,
and concentrate the texture
of these vegetables,
best to do the old salt and squeeze so...
See how much water is coming out of this?
- Yeah.
- I've just barely
started to work with it.
So this is gonna start
to concentrate the flavor
and even preserve the crunchy
texture of the cucumber.
Salt and squeeze, s.
- Oh t, t is a great one for...
I think it's very important
for all employees,
no matter where you work,
to take some time off.
Especially creatively to go
and recharge your batteries right?
- That's so cute I love that tip.
- Oh yeah, I think so.
So take some time off,
it's very important.
If you don't use it, you lose 'em.
Something like that.
- This umeboshi plum paste.
It's commonly referred to
as salted Japanese plums
but they're closer to apricots actually.
You'll see mostly whole and
it's a type of Japanese pickle
also known as tsukemono.
- [Japanese Woman] Tsukemono.
- Very very salt and I
would pair it would things
that are very just kind of,
plain like just a bowl of rice.
- Salty and really sour.
- Salty and really sour.
I love it, I can eat it on its own.
- I like it too.
- Right?
- Vermouth is an aperitif.
And there is white ones and there red ones
and they have sort of
different plants and...
- Botanicals, yeah.
- Botanicals and bitters in it.
- These are not fully
oxidized so they will oxidize.
- They don't last forever.
- And the aroma will go,
so keep it in the fridge,
stoppered and in the fridge.
- And I love it. [laughing]
- W is for wax paper.
Which is not that same as parchment paper.
I made that mistake one
time when I was in college.
I put wax paper down and I
was baking a loaf of bread
on top of it and it filled
my entire house with smoke.
- And it melted.
- And it melted, wax paper
does not go in the oven,
parchment paper goes in the oven.
- This is an anti-wax campaign.
- You know what?
No wax paper.
- [beep] wax paper
- We don't do wax paper anymore.
- We hate it.
- Nope, canceled.
- X is for x marks the spot.
[laughing]
So this is a way to
quickly remove the skins of
either tomatoes or stone fruit
if you're going to then cook them.
So you take a very sharp paring knife
and just cut an x in the tip.
Drop them into boiling
water for 30 seconds
and then lift them up and
transfer them to ice water
to stop the cooking.
- Ice.
- You're not cooking the tomatoes,
you're just peeling them.
These skins will peel back
really easily once you do that.
- Beautiful.
[upbeat percussion music]
- Yogurt.
- We shot this video already Priya.
[laughing]
- As you know yogurt is
my all-time favorite food.
I've mixed it with herbs and
grated cucumber, make a raita.
Strain it, mix in sugar and
cardamomum , make a shrikhand,
this beautiful sweet cardamomum pudding.
I use it to marinade chicken.
There are infinite uses for yogurt.
You should always have a tub of this
and get the whole milk
stuff not the fat-free.
Do not buy fat-free yogurt.
- Get it outta here.
[upbeat percussion music]
- So I'm a little bit
particular about the way I zest.
So I do a single pass and
I do it along the length
of the lime and I'm rolling
the lime along the length here
and then I'm turning
with my fingers as I go.
Because if you dig down more than that,
you're just gonna start
to pick up the bitter pith
underneath and you're
not really getting zest.
So I see people...
[lime scraping]
- Yeah, you get all the white stuff.
- And it's like what have you done.
What have you done.
What are you doing?
That's not right.
You can do this kind of style
of a wide-style vegetable peeler is great.
You can then cut that zest into strips
if you want it for decoration,
you know for baked goods or whatnot.
Yeah, cool, zest.
[upbeat percussion music]
