Haggis: Hard to make, but there’s nothing like it

Daunting to make and icky to contemplate, haggis is honored as Robert Burns’ favorite dish.

TheStar.com | living | Haggis: Hard to make, but there’s nothing like it.

Home Cooks: Wasting Time, Money and Energy in the Kitchen

Americans waste hundreds of dollars per year when cooking because they are unaware of the opportunities to save energy and time in their home kitchens. Based on ongoing research and kitchen observation, most cooks use inappropriate appliances, misuse kitchen tools and select the wrong methods for their cooking tasks.

According to KitchenetteCookware.com Chef and Founder Sara Hohn, these seemingly minor decisions made when cooking result in countless hours lost and energy wasted every day. “A lot of progress has been made in making the public aware of conserving energy throughout the home,” said Hohn. “but the kitchen, with its many appliances and high energy usage, is often overlooked.”

Hohn has developed the concept of “Green Cooking.” Green Cooking pertains not only to the appliances cooks use, but the habits practiced when cooking. Some ways to reduce a household’s energy consumption through Green Cooking are:

1. When cooking or reheating small meals, use a small toaster oven. In general, the smaller the appliance, the less energy used, so choose the smallest appliance suited to your cooking task.
2. In the oven, stagger dishes at different rack levels to ensure proper air flow. Good air flow helps the oven work more quickly and efficiently.
3. Pressure-cooking is the easiest and fastest green cooking method. A new, efficient pressure cooker can reduce energy consumption for cooking by more than half.

In general, using Green Cooking tactics, cooks can reduce waste, use less energy, less water and make less noise during the cooking process.

No Grill, No Vent, No Problem

A lot of hot air is expelled about cooking a steak. A proper steak: thick — preferably prime and dry-aged — and cooked so it’s deeply, crustily browned, almost (but please, not quite) blackened on the outside and juicily red on the inside.

It is possible to cook a steak with a nice crust without risking a kitchen fire.

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How to cook a pig’s head

Cooking a pig’s head is not for the faint of heart.

The return to snout-to-tail eating is changing that.

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Braising: Impressive but Easy

In her quest to learn to cook, Emily Weinstein finds that braising lamb is one way to create an impressive but easy dinner.

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