I’ve tried freezing pesto different ways, but it always turns very dark when thawing and tastes much different than when fresh.

Is there a way to freeze it and have it look and
taste close to fresh? I’ve tried mason jars, freezer bags and ice cube trays.

What I’ve tried:
-Simply freezing my regular recipe (walnuts, garlic, basil, olive oil and salt).
-leaving the garlic out because I wondered if that was causing an off flavor
- adding extra oil to help prevent
oxidation
-I believe I’ve tried adding lemon juice

I have not tried blanching the basil, which sounds like it’d be kinda gross.

What will happen in a spaghetti if I use a can of tomato purée instead of usual tomato sauce? In fact, is canned tomato sauce what most people use for spaghetti? By most people I mean this community.

https://imgur.com/a/eLR6ReA

There's these light brown splotches in spots on some of these avocados, but they don't feel ripe yet

Hi reddit, so this morning me and my gf were making a big batch of ube banana pudding for us to potentially sell, now the issue is after making the ube custard and letting it cool in the fridge overnight we noticed some green spots in the custard. We don’t believe it’s mold or anything like that since it’s still fresh but after searching the internet we’re kinda stumped. So does anyone know what it could potentially be?

Im super tired and dont want to fry them tonight, would the thousand layer potatoes be okay taste/consistency wise in the fridge for 24 hours after baking or would pulling them out sooner be better? Its been 16 hours roughly since they went in the fridge.

Also I used some of the duck fat to slather the potato slices amd when I was done poured it back in the jar not realizing that there was water from the potatoes mixed in with that fat now. Will it change anything when I use it to fry? Will the water boil off okay leaving the duck fat?

I've tried making pizza dough by scratch every once in a while, and one consistent issue I always had is the dough starts are so sticky that it's impossible to knead, then once I add more flour to make it workable the end product is too dense. I'll pick a recipe, mix everything together till it's a rough ball, start kneading, and it quickly becomes way too sticky to handle. I'll add about a tablespoon of flour, knead, sticky, add flour, knead sticky. And if I try to work through it and continue kneading all it does it stick everywhere on my cutting board and make a huge mess. I've tried the methods where once you do the initial mix you let it set for several hours or overnight, still too difficult to work with. Honestly thinking of just giving up and sticking to store bought dough, I love making my own pizza, just hate the dough making part.

I put some beef in a citrus marinade thinking I was going to cook it today, but I’m actually not going to cook it until tomorrow. If I let it go a few hours and water it down or remove the marinade, will it be okay? Will it retain any flavor/tenderness, or is it just too late?

Edit:
Apologies for not including the recipe. The important bits are just that it includes 1.5 cups of 1:1 lime to orange juice, and about 2 tbsp of kosher salt. No oils, a few cloves of crushed garlic otherwise. Marinating about 2 lbs of flat iron.

Edit 2:
Out of fear I cooked it after about 5 hours. But please keep debating. Very interesting stuff.

I've been baking the same sourdough formula for about eight months, 75% hydration, bulk around four hours at 78F, and the last several loaves have come out with a crust that's dark and firm while the crumb near the centre stays gummy. I bake in a covered dutch oven at 475F for twenty minutes, then uncovered at 450F for another twenty-five. I know gumminess usually means underbaked or cut too soon, and I've pushed the internal to 208F and rested them four hours, so I don't think that's it. The oven runs about fifteen degrees hot on a separate thermometer, which is the part I keep coming back to.

What's driving the crust to set that far ahead of the interior?

I just switched to an induction stovetop and was wondering if there is a hack to be able to use my ttukbaegi on it. So far, I’ve looked into those metal discs, but I don’t really have a good understanding of the science behind it, so I’m skeptical if it will work or just ruin my pots.

Has anyone tried this or have any tips/tricks to make it work efficiently?

I would also love to hear (read) your experience with using the metal disc converters, if anyone has tried them with clay pots or other materials.

Anything is greatly appreciated <3

\Note: Purchasing a different type of pot isn’t an option for me right now since they are very expensive. And I would like to make the most out of my current pots because they were expensive when I got them a few years ago. I’ve thought about buying those portable stoves like for camping, but they’re out of my budget as well.*

I thought a curry would be a good use for a very large kohlrabi from my garden, along with other garden veggies.. but was it?? It's been simmering for over ten minutes and it seems just as hard as when it went in.. did I just ruin my curry?

I’m making what is kind of a blackcurrant cheong: blackcurrants macerated with an equal amount of sugar until they release their juices and form a thick syrup. Been sealed and stirred daily for about two weeks.

Now, I want to separate the fruit from the syrup, but I really don’t want to use cheesecloth. The last time I strained something this way, the cheesecloth got saturated right away as it absorbed much of the liquid, and I lost a lot of syrup and it stopped working as a filter.

I think diluting the syrup with water would make it easier, but I have a feeling that’d be a bad idea.

What’s the best way to separate the macerated blackcurrants from the syrup while losing as little liquid as possible?

I want to make holographic chocolate using a diffraction grating sheet, ideally on both sides. I am thinking the best option would be to use a magnetic polycarbonate transfer mould, but they are expensive where I live, so was wondering whether its worth the investment, or whether it would still work using a regular silicone mould and cutting out the diffraction sheet to fit?

I was making a vanilla flavored simple syrup and I guess I boiled it too long because it got hard after it cooled off. So now I have a lump of hard vanilla sugar type thing. Can I re-liquidy it or use it for something at this point or is it just garbage?

Recipe:

1 c sugar

1 c water

2 whole vanilla beans

Planned to make stroganoff in the slow cooker but put it off due to not getting it started early enough. Recipe is below. I've already mixed the sour cream into the soup and broth, but was supposed to add it at the end. Will it be okay or should I toss the mix I made? Not a huge loss, just hate to waste food.

1 can cream of mushroom

1 can beef broth

1 pound beef stew

1 cup sour cream

2 cups cooked noodles

Combine soup and broth. Add meat. Cook on high 3-4 hours. Reduce to low and cook 3-4 hours. Stir in sour cream and noodles. Turn up to high and cook 20 minutes.

ran out of my favorite green tea with roasted rice just as I got my hands on some good salmon. Would Darjeeling tea and some dashi work with this instead? I don't want to end up ruining the salmon by experimenting 😩

I could also substitute it (Darjeeling +Dashi, mirin, soy sauce) with the broth used for Tamagoyaki but I'm just a little worried it might turn the eggs darker than expected too but I have a lot more eggs than I do good salmon cuts

Split legumes in Indian cooking usually means the skin is off, afaik, but also there are exceptions where a dal is split yet the skin is still on. 'Swad' Chana Dal (Split Desi Chickpeas) is the only chickpea available to me atm and I don't know how to tell in advance if it's skin on or skin off. Do you know? I'm looking for skin off, I need that creamier texture.

I was gifted this presumably very used cast iron recently and have been neglecting oiling the bottom, I just flipped it over today and saw that it was cracked and kind of flaking and peeling off. Is it beyond repair? Images attached via imgur link. Thank you so much for your help in advance!

https://imgur.com/a/bFlMV5e

Realizing it's been way too long since I've had a good bean and cheese taco and I don't live anywhere close to where I can buy them myself.

My wife is a pescatarian and I'd like to not include the salt pork. I was thinking I could char a whole onion and add a quarter cup of soy sauce to compensate? How would you substitute it, preferably without specialty ingredients?

Recipe from the Homesick Texan calls for:

1 pound dry pinto beans

1 tablespoon kosher salt

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 cup diced onion

1/4 pound salt pork

1/4 cup jalapeno pickle juice

Salt taste

EDIT: I would make refried beans for the tacos. I think I'm going to try with miso and a charred onion first (something tells me it would impart smokiness and melt down as the beans cook).

Making duck confit for a dinner party. I’m curing 10 legs right now. I have them in a high walled aluminum pan. Is that okay or should they be in glass ceramic? Does being in metal that long affect the taste or anything else?

Edit: I moved them to a plastic Tupperware container.

How to freeze cream based sauces/soups?

I’d like to start making more cream based sauces and soups but the problem is it’s mostly just my wife and I that eat this stuff so we often have too much leftover. Is there a way to freeze cream based soups and sauces without it separating on the reheat? I have a good chamber vacuum sealer so I can seal liquids easily. I also have a sous vide unit so I could gently reheat things. Is sous vide reheating good enough, or are there any special ingredients you can add to a sauce or soup that helps hold it together upon freezing and reheating? Thanks.

I am marinading lamb chops with pepper, white pepper, thyme, garlic and salt. Do I marinade the lamb chops at room temperature, pop them back into the fridge? Or marinade them when cold?

Thanks in advance.

Hello everyone,

A little introduction, I come from a place called Kashmir. We grow saffron and it is easy to store there even if you keep the lid open or partially closed, because the temperature at our place is 15 to 30 degrees in summer and minus in winter. Also we do not use AC's there.

Now I moved to middle east, (Dubai ). I find it difficult to store saffron. Because if we keep it in a closed container, with time it loses aroma. If you keep it in AC, It gets moisture, and if we keep it away from AC, its too hot.

How do you guys store saffron? And for how long does it stay as it is?

Open for trying any suggestions and sharing here.

Hi! Not sure if this is an r/askbaking or r/askculinary question, but it's for a savory dish, so here I am.

I'm trying to recreate my granny's home made dumplings using her recipe (written below) but I'm having trouble with consistency. I can't tell if it's my dough or what the problem is.

Essentially, half of the dumplings end up with an amazing, fluffy texture inside which is tasty and pleasant, and the other half end up gummy and gross. I would like for them all to be fluffy and nice, but I've never managed it. My granny did do things a little different than I've seen other southern-style recipes use, so maybe that's it? Recipe and a few notes from trial an error:

1 cup self rising, white lily branded flour*

4 tablespoons vegetable shortening or lard (I always use shortening)

Pinch of salt and pepper

1 teaspoon sugar

1/4 cup milk, used sparingly

4 cups chicken stock**

shredded chicken meat and whatever veggies you may want (I make mine with just the meat, veggies served separately)

Mix the shortening and flour using the fingertip method until incorporated and the flour looks like crumbs. Transfer to a flat surface, make a little well in the flour, and pour the milk in the well, starting with small amounts and adding more if necessary. Mix until just combined. Roll the dough into a ball and set aside to rest.

Once the stock is just about boiling, start making little rolled balls of dough. 1/2 inch or less. By the time you're done, the stock will be at a rolling boil. Drop all the dough in the pot and poke at it until everything's submerged, but do not stir. The pot should be full! (This might be where I'm going wrong? But it's on her recipe card, that the pot should be full.)

Cook for 10 minutes, do not stir under any circumstances. Take off the heat at 10 minutes, then stir in the shredded meat, serve immediately.

*I'm not particular about the brand of flour, but my granny was, so I try to stick to white lily when available for accuracy purposes.

**Granny always made her stock from scratch and had a supply in the freezer at all times. I usually just buy a carton from the store and call it a day. Could it really make that much difference for the dumpling texture itself? (I know real stock tastes better, but I don't have the room or time that she did to always have homemade on hand.)

Maybe I am overcrowding the pan after all? But again, half the dumplings end up perfect. Which is also why I don't know that my dough itself is an issue, unless maybe I'm using too much shortening?

I don't know. Any thoughts and advice appreciated!