Hot Food Hacks Posts
How To: De-Stink Old Smelly Jars with Two Simple Ingredients
It's so nice to be able to reuse old glass jars for food storage. Occasionally, though, even the sturdiest container has to be recycled because it retains the smell of its previous contents. Usually the culprit was garlic, garlic-based, or something pickled, and you're certainly not going to store your fresh herbs or fruit in that. There is, however, a quick and easy way to get that old stink out of your jar and make it usable again. You just need two things...
How To: Use Up Lettuce & Other Greens Before They Go Bad (Without Making Any Salads)
I love me some salad, but I'm also kind of a big baby when it comes to eating them. The greens have to be perfectly crisp and fresh, which is why I'm such a nut about storing them properly, including rethinking how I use my refrigerator, using a paper towel or dry cloth to wrap them, or even puffing a little CO2 into the plastic bag to keep them fresh. I've even developed an arsenal of tricks to restore life to soggy greens.
Decoding Produce Stickers: The Hidden Meaning Behind Fruit & Vegetable Labels
Like Costco's price codes or the tags on your bread, the numerical codes printed on those sticky little fruit and vegetable labels can reveal a lot of information to us consumers. Once you understand the codes, you can look at that little label (also known as PLU, or "price look up" label) and know whether the produce you're about to buy or eat was treated with pesticides, genetically modified, both, or neither. Before we go any further with deciphering the codes on these labels, let's take a...
How To: Don't Have a Special Cupcake Pan? Here's How to Bake Cupcakes and Muffins Without One
Love or hate 'em, you've got to admit that cupcakes really had their moment. They started rising in popularity back in 2003 with the opening of Crumbs Bake Shop in Manhattan, and quickly became one of the most annoyingly ubiquitous food trends to date. Seriously. Type "cupcake" into Google. While I wouldn't turn it down if you put one in front of me (red velvet, please), I can't say that I was particularly disappointed to hear that the cupcake trend is coming to an end. I'm more of a cheeseca...
How To: Form a Makeshift Roasting Rack Out of Foil for Crispier & Healthier Oven-Cooked Bacon
There are so many kitchen gadgets that only do one thing. You can buy a special tool to strip the kernels off an ear of corn, de-stem your strawberries, or cut bananas into perfectly uniform slices, but that's all it'll do. It's easy to get carried away, and before you know it you find yourself designating an "everything" or "miscellaneous" drawer. Then there are the tools that have multiple functions, but you know you'd never use them often enough to justify spending the money. Unless you co...
How To: How & Why You Should Make Your Own Protein Powder
Protein powder is a fad in the same way that Justin Bieber's music is: you either love it, or you hate it. Everyone I know has a strong opinion about protein powder, ranging from "daily necessity" to "utterly useless."
How To: Black Peppercorns Make a Surprisingly Delicious Tea
I'll be the first to admit that I have a problem: I'm utterly addicted to tea.
Whisking: We're All Doing It Wrong
Whisking liquids seems somehow quaint, especially since there are good, cheap devices out there like immersion blenders and hand mixers that can whip cream, turn egg whites into meringue, and mix batters for you.
How To: Revive a Stale Baguette Using the Miraculous Water Trick
Everyone talks about how great sliced bread is, but there's nothing better than the taste of a just-baked loaf of crusty French bread. Like most beautiful things in life, however, the beauty of the baguette doesn't last. The next day, it's rock-hard, and good for very little except for croutons or breadcrumbs. But there is a trick to make it like fresh again.
How To: Make Perfectly Circular McMuffin-Style Eggs Without Special Tools
We like our Egg McMuffins around here, albeit homemade with our preferred ingredients: whole wheat (or homemade sourdough) English muffins, a slice of thick Tillamook cheddar cheese, a meat, perhaps, like Canadian bacon, and finally—that perfectly-fried, perfectly-shaped egg.
How To: Keep Your Burger Juicy & Your Bun Dry
There's nothing worse than biting excitedly into your indulgent restaurant-style burger only to find a soggy mess of a bun on your plate. The conundrum of keeping a patty moist but bun dry has perplexed home cooks and chefs alike, and even top burger joints are guilty of soggy-bun syndrome.
How To: Tired of Flat Soda? Use This Trick to Keep Two-Liter Bottles of Soda Fizzy Longer
A flat soda tastes awful. It's almost as bad as drinking a room temperature milkshake. Of course, you can always opt to buy single-serving cans or 20 ounce bottles, but that's always going to be more expensive than 2-liters.
How To: Tell if Your 'Expired' Eggs Are Still Good to Eat
A lot of people rely on the date on the packaging to tell them when food has gone bad, even with eggs, but the sell-by dates are often somewhat arbitrary and are not expiration dates. If you've been tossing your eggs based on the dates on your carton—you could be wasting perfectly good food.
How To: Roll Sushi—The Ultimate Guide
Sushi rolls, known as makizushi in Japanese, are only limited by your imagination—and your ability to roll them neatly, of course. While it may seem like a lot of effort, rolling sushi is a snap if you have the right tools.
How To: Make a Self-Freezing Coca-Cola Slushy (Or Any Kind of Instant Soda Slurpee)
In my last quick clip, I demonstrated how to take a bottle of soda and freeze it on command. I received many requests for a more detailed article on this, so here we go. This "super cool" trick works with cans of soda too, not just bottles!
How To: Dehydrate Food Without a Dehydrator
I grew up in a rural town, and that meant that we dehydrated a lot of food. Even with a hungry family of five, there was no way that we could eat all of the season's tomatoes before they molded, or all of the orchard's apples before they grew soft, or all of the wild mushrooms that we picked. And so our dehydrator was always getting a good workout.
The Ultimate Onion Cheat Sheet: Which Onion Goes Best with What?
Most recipes don't specify what type they mean when they call for onions. While using whatever kind you already have won't necessarily ruin a dish, using the best one for what you're cooking will definitely make your food taste better.
How To: Make Jamie Oliver's 'Cheat's' Pizza in 30 Minutes or Less
I'm constantly searching for a homemade pizza dough that tastes good but isn't too challenging to execute. In other words, a recipe that doesn't require any arcane "dough whispering" skills. However, my hunt may be coming to an end thanks to one celebrity chef's concept.
How To: Skip the Oven—Microwave Your Fish
Fish are delicate, flaky, and can be damn tricky to cook; more often than not, you end up with a hard, dry block of flesh that makes your taste buds sad. And the best ways to cook fish that you know of—c'mon, who doesn't love a fried fish—take way too much effort for you to bother with on a weeknight. Or maybe you're looking for a healthier way to enjoy fish that doesn't require batter or frying at all.
How To: 11 Ways to Keep Cheese Fresh & Mold-Free for as Long as Possible in Your Fridge
Cheese is one of the most loved foods in the world, and there are hundreds of different types. Some prefer super expensive gourmet cheeses, others are fine with the cheaper processed stuff.
How To: Make Delicious Thai Sticky Rice Without a Steamer or Rice Cooker
If you're a fan of Thai food, I'm sure you're familiar with sticky rice. There is something so special about its chewy texture and sweet flavor. If you have a desire to make it in your own kitchen but don't have the proper tools such as a traditional bamboo basket or stackable steamer, there are several other methods that work just as well. Once you try these alternative methods, I'm sure you'll be "sticking" to them for a while. What Makes Sticky Rice So Sticky?
How To: Remove Old Food & Drink Stains with This Cheap, Easy Homemade Solution
I own two aprons—a cute one for company, and another for the hard-core cooking duties, like cutting up chicken and making stock. The sad truth is that I almost never remember to wear either of them. So, much of my clothing ends up spattered with grease, liquid, and bits of fruit and vegetable. While stain-removing sprays, sticks, and pens are all effective to a certain extent, they have two drawbacks—they're expensive and sometimes I need to use them in large quantity, like when a piece of eg...
How To: What to Do When You Don't Have a Mortar & Pestle
We're all familiar with the sinking feeling that happens when you cruise through a recipe, only to arrive at an instruction that calls for a tool you don't have. Some of the best food hacks (and my personal favorites) exist to combat that problem. Why spend money on a kitchen tool—or worse, avoid a recipe altogether—when you could find a new way to achieve the same result?
How To: Make a Fire Snake from Sugar & Baking Soda
A fire snake, also referred to as a black snake or sugar snake, is a classic science experiment you can do right in your own kitchen using a baking soda and sugar mixture and a fuel to ignite the reaction.
How To: Yes, You Can Make Frosting with Jello—And It's Amazing
Frosting, for many, is the best part of the cake. There's not much to dislike about it, after all—there's a type of frosting for every person. Whipped frostings for those who like it light, dense buttercream for indulgent sugar fans, cream cheese frosting for the tangy crowd... and so on. But I'll bet you've never made or tried frosting made with Jell-O packages before! Infusing your frosting with the sweetness and bright color of Jell-O changes both its taste and appearance, and using Jell-O...
How To: Expired or Still Good? The Quickest Way to Test Baking Soda & Baking Powder for Freshness
Baking powder and baking soda are two staples almost everyone has around that seem to last forever. But a lot of people don't know that they eventually start to lose their potency after enough time on the shelf. If you can't remember when you bought it, it's probably time for a new box.
How To: 10 Ways to Open a Beer Without a Bottle Opener
As exciting as it can be to crack open a beer, there's nothing fun about wandering around a party and asking other partygoers for a bottle opener.
How To: 8 Tricks That Make Boxed Cake Mix Taste Like Homemade
Ask ten different people how they feel about boxed cake mixes, and you'll likely get ten different answers. Some baking purists will berate them and throw them in the same category as garlic presses and knife sets sold on infomercials. Many people will say that they prefer not to use mixes, but keep one in the pantry just in case. And I dare you to find a college student that doesn't sing their praises.
How To: The Easiest Way to Make Quick Cheese at Home (Using Only 3 Common Ingredients)
As much as I love eating weird foods, when it comes to my favorite food, there is only one simple choice: cheese. Since cheese is my favorite to eat, it should come as no surprise that it's one of my favorites to make as well.
How To: Easily Separate Fat from Stock, Soup, or Meat Drippings
I love making stock. It's thrifty because you get extra use out of poultry bones and vegetable peelings, plus having homemade stock on hand makes so many things taste better, from soup to stews to pasta sauces. If you deglaze a pan, homemade turkey stock, booze of some kind, and butter will create an eye-rollingly good sauce in mere moments. One task I do not love? Figuring out how to skim the damn fat off the stock (or soup) after I've made it. It's necessary to skim the fat as you boil down...
How To: Rehydrate Rock-Hard Dried Fruit with This Clever Hack
Dried fruit makes a great snack or salad topping, but after a while, they tend to become fossilized, rock-hard versions of their former selves. At this point, most folks probably just toss them out, as they're unpleasant to chew on when eaten raw and even more unpleasant to eat in bread or cooked with other ingredients.
How To: 10 Absolutely Ingenious Ways to Open Wine Without a Corkscrew
Unless you like boxed wine, your wine bottles are going to either be sealed with a cork or a screw cap, the latter of which should not be frowned upon, especially if it's white wine. However, most wineries still prefer corks over screw caps, and that means you'll need a corkscrew.
How To: Shuck an Oyster Without an Oyster Knife
There are few kitchen tools as elusive as the oyster knife. Many people—even seafood lovers—don't own one. If you do own one, it probably gets used so infrequently that it gets sent to the very back of the shelf where it proceeds to get lost. Then you accidentally find the knife once a month when you don't need it, but can't for the life of you find the sneaky little thing when you do need it.
How To: A Step-by-Step Guide to Homemade Sushi Rolls
Without a doubt, sushi is one of my favorite foods—dainty and delectable, while also fun to make. So let's get started with maki rolls, aka makizushi, probably the most iconic form of sushi. You know, the one filled with rice and your standard sushi ingredients, rolled up in a sheet of dried seaweed.
How To: Easy DIY Gourmet Chocolate Bars
We've showed you how to make Butterfingers and Kit Kats, as well as custom-shaped chocolates, but have you ever thought about making your own gourmet chocolate bars?
How To: Use These Restaurant Secrets to Reduce the Pungency of Raw Onions
We've all been there: you're staring at a fantastic-looking salad or sandwich full of your favorite ingredients. You take a bite, and you taste only one thing—raw onion. A glass of water, a toothbrush, and an hour later, and your breath still tastes like only one thing—raw onion.
How To: Steam Food Without a Steamer Basket
I'm not a big fan of single-use tools, especially ones that don't get used particularly often. And I'm especially not a big fan of seldom used single-use tools that take up a large amount of space.
How To: The Ultimate Potato Cheat Sheet: Which Potato Goes Best with What?
I've been a fan of potatoes ever since I can remember... but mainly because they weren't a big part of my daily diet (which usually consisted of rice). And because my experience with potatoes was so limited, I only knew of two varieties growing up: big, brown Russets and sinewy sweet potatoes. As for cooking with potatoes—well, I'm embarrassed to admit that the only time I cooked potatoes when I was a kid was with the instant kind.
How To: The Secret to Cleaning Scuff Marks Off Dishes & Silverware Faster (& Why It Works)
White or light-colored dinnerware is a classic: it looks crisp, clean, and elegant. The only problem is that after you've used it for a few years, the surfaces bear a lot of grey scuff marks from forks, spoons, and knives being dragged across the surface.
How To: 5 Tricks You Need to Know to Make Perfect Chocolate Crinkle Cookies
Desserts always taste better when they are sugar-coated—and even more so when they're coated in powdered sugar. In particular, crinkle cookies—cake-y cookies that are chewy on the inside and crispy on the outside—are famous for the powdered sugar that creates their cracked appearance.
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