Cooking 101

Probably the most common type of question I get in my email and comments involves asking for healthy recipe substitutions. While I do enjoy eating healthy, I’ll be the first to admit that several of my recipes aren’t the healthiest they can be. What can I say? I like my butter and bacon. That being [...]

Hi guys! I wanted to share some very helpful information my mother-in-law, Jody, gave me a while ago about decoding meat and dairy product labels. I don’t know about you, but I get confused easily sometimes.  I mean…with food labels.  I mean…what? Exactly. Anyways, Jody found this very helpful list at the Environmental Working Group‘s [...]

I thought I’d share five common cooking mistakes we probably all have done (or still do) in our kitchens and how to fix them. It’s okay.  Sometimes, we can get lazy.  Or careless.  Or maybe we don’t even know better. Lucky for us, there are usually ways to fix these common mistakes without having the [...]

Ever heard of the “Dirty Dozen”? If not, it’s a list of the 12 fruits and vegetables that contain the most pesticides. The Environmental Working Group (EWG), a non-profit organization specializing in research and advocacy related to public health and the environment, recently released its “Dirty Dozen” list for 2011.    Here’s the 2011 list: [...]

In my last Cooking 101 post on Why Use Kosher Salt?, I asked for suggestions on what topics you would like me to cover in future Cooking 101 posts.   I received lots of great ideas, one of which was to cover the different types of yeast. So, for this Cooking 101, I’d like to [...]

In my recipes, when I use include salt, it is almost always kosher salt (as opposed to other types of kitchen salt like sea salt or table salt). Given this, people have asked me what it is about kosher salt that I prefer. So, for this Cooking 101 post, I thought I’d explain some of [...]

What’s your main goal when you’re cooking (for yourself or for others)? I’m guessing it is to make something tasty.  That’s always a good goal. The last thing you want to do is make yourself or others sick from poor food handling. So, for this Cooking 101 post, I wanted to share some information with [...]

Maintaining good, sharp knives in your kitchen is a vital part of creating delicious food. A sharp knife will enable you to move quicker and make more efficient cuts. Why keep sharp knives? Good question.  I have heard lots of people say they actually prefer their knives to be more dull than sharp, thinking they [...]

Congrats to Christine who was randomly selected (using a random number generator) as my giveaway winner for the A Sweet Pea Chef apron! Thank you as well to all of you who entered your comments. I loved reading which recipes and images you liked on dishfolio as well as your suggestions for future posts.   [...]