Cookthink

If heat equals strength and this is the World's Strongest Man Contest, the habanero chile can lift an 18-wheeler. The serrano can lift a VW van. The jalapeño can lift a Vespa, which is still pretty powerful compared to the pepperoncini lifting a Big Wheel way down at the bottom of the Scoville scale. But there is much more to a chile pepper than its brawn. Different varieties have different flavors, colors and shapes and play different roles in cooking. Here’s a breakdown of three popular varieties. The habanero: Lantern-shaped and bright yellow or orange, the habanero is the hottest chile that is readily available in U.S. groceries. You can seed habaneros to lower the heat, but when working with them, wear gloves and keep your hands away from your face. Wash anything that touches the chile's seeds or juices. The habanero's floral, tangy flavor works well as the focal point of a dip. The serrano: Looks like a slender jalapeño. As it ages, it turns from green to red to yellow. Rich and potentially blistering (though sometimes fairly mild), serranos show up most often in salsas, marinades, sauces and chilis. Its size and shape make the serrano difficult to core and seed, so the best way to temper it is by using less of it. The jalapeño: A workhorse pepper that is easy to find in most grocery stores. It's easy to work with, too. If you have a moderate tolerance for heat, you should be able to handle a jalapeño without removing the seeds and ribs. (If you're less tolerant of heat, try taking out the seeds and ribs.) Jalapeños are dark green (red when extra ripe) and have a sweet flavor that is similar to a bell pepper with a kick. Reference: Help! I ate a hot pepper! (Cookthink) Reference: How to seed a chile pepper (Cookthink) Reference:: Why are some jalapenos hotter than others? (Cookthink)

Peeling eggs: do it underwater

It never occurred to me that I still had something left to learn about peeling boiled eggs. However, the other day when I was running some oeufs mollets—boiled eggs with firm whites and gooey yolks—under cold water to make them tolerable to peel, I dropped one onto the bottom of the pan. The shell splintered, so rather than taking it out of the water and rolling it around to break up and loosen the shell, I did it in the water. To my surprise, the fragile egg became much easier to peel. The water got under the shell and seemingly liberated it and the thin membrane underneath. After that I had an absolute orgy of egg boiling and peeling. Reference: How to hard boil an egg (Cookthink) Reference: What's the difference between white and brown eggs (Cookthink)

Root Source: Egg

What can't you do with an egg? You can't grill it, but you can boil it, broil it, fry it, roast it, scramble it, simmer it, steam it or drop it from 10 meters in a balsam wood cage. incredible The really amazing thing about the egg is the versatility of textures it can create. It can be as light as a meringue, and as dense as a pound cake. It all depends on how you rearrange an egg's proteins--break them apart and whip them full of air, or use them to bind together heavier ingredients like cream and sugar. colorblind Some chickens produce white eggs, others brown. Some are even blue. Among the common grocery store offerings, there isn't too much difference, whatever the color. put together An egg is made up of a couple of different components: a semi-permeable outer shell, a viscous "albumen" or white, and the center yolk, which is also made up of microscopic layers. Many recipes call for either the yolk or the white alone. Don't worry, separating them is is easy enough to do. sinker As eggs age, they gradually lose moisture through the pores inthe shells. So an old egg will be much less dense than a new one. You can test an egg's relative freshness by putting it in a bowl of cold water; the fresher it is, the faster it sinks. And if it floats, toss it out. no boil Don't let the name fool you. Actual boiling water is too violent for cooking eggs; the constant bubbling shifts them around, possibly cracking the shell and letting the white leak out. Eggs should be cooked in barely simmering water, 3-5 minutes for soft boiled or coddled eggs, 10-15 minutes for hard boiled. what you need A nonstick pan is almost essential for eggs. It lets you fry or scramble or make an omelet without using a lot of butter. Unless you want to, of course. For the true egg devotee, try any of the recipes in The Good Egg: More than 200 Fresh Approaches from Breakfast to Dessert. Make sure to pick up a few dozen eggs first. If you're a stickler for perfectly round fried eggs (it can't overlap your English muffin, after all), try an egg form. what you do The lightest of desserts, this Apple Snow will look graceful on any table. Try your eggs Passover- style with Matzo Brie. Think of it as Jewish French toast. When scrambled eggs grow up, they become quiche. And what little scramble wouldn't want to be an elegant Quiche Lorraine? These Spicy Baked Eggs with Tofu are great for breakfast, lunch, dinner, or that late-night craving. featured recipe This springy Pasta with Leeks, Asparagus, Mushrooms, And Fried Eggs is the featured recipe of this week's Root Source Challenge. We loved the creaminess of the cheese combined with the yolk of the egg. Congratulations to Amy and Jonny of We Are Never Full.

Cookthink PSA: Buy tongs!

Tongs are the most useful tool in the kitchen. Having a good pair of tongs is like having a heatproof robotic arm in the kitchen. Consider a partial list of things you can do with a pair of tongs: stir something in a sizzling pan; flip something in a sizzling pan; move something around in a sizzling pan; spear something in a sizzling pan; push something in a sizzling pan to check for doneness; hold something above a sizzling pan to taste it; take something out of a sizzling pan. And that's just around a sizzling pan. Standing around a grill or reaching inside an oven, tongs are critical. You can spend a small fortune on specialty tongs, but you don't have to. OXO's Good Grips stainless steel tongs are inexpensive and probably as special as you’ll ever need. So here's our public service announcement - buy tongs now.

How to chop cilantro

Cilantro is the parsley of the East, where it's known as "coriander leaves" or "dhani". (In Mexico, where it's also very popular, it's sometimes called "Mexican parsley".) If you like cilantro (and some people don't at all), the herb is an easy way to add a beautifully fresh, sweet, fruity flavor to any dish. To prep it, first rinse and shake dry the leaves. Hold the bouquet at an angle with the leaves against the cutting board. Run your knife down the side of the bouquet to slice away the leaves. It's fine to remove some of the tender stems along with the leaves. (In fact, for salsas, spice pastes, curries and some longer-cooking dishes, the stems add essential, concentrated cilantro flavor.) Now just run your knife back and forth across the pile of leaves, chopping them as coarsely or as finely as you need to. The closer to the end of the cooking you plan to add the cilantro, the finer you'll want to chop it. But since cilantro is so tender it's usually okay to keep the the chop coarse. Now that you know how to prep it, try some cilantro recipes at Cookthink.com.

Help! I ate a hot pepper!

What should you do if you eat a pepper that sets your tongue on fire? Do not drink beer. Water won’t help either. (In a Caribbean folktale, children drown in a river trying to cool their tongues after eating habanero stew. See Dave Dewitt and Nancy Gerlach's The Pepper Pantry for the full story.) Capsaicin, the chemical that makes a hot pepper hot, doesn’t dissolve in water, so even ice water won’t help remove the heat. Your best bet? Get milk. Because capsaicin is fat-soluble, a compound in milk can actually pull the capsaicin off your tongue and relieve some of the burn. Another option: eat bread or rice to absorb the heat. Cucumber can also have a cooling effect. If you are feeling brave (or masochistic), you could try eating another pepper. According Robert Berkley, the author of Peppers: A Cookbook, you can build up a resistance to capsaicin by eating more chile peppers. With Berkley’s approach, you get the added high of a capsaicin-triggered endorphin release. Before you know it, you might be addicted to the hot little things. Reference: How to seed a chile pepper (Cookthink) Reference:: Why are some jalapenos hotter than others? (Cookthink)