Iced Tea x 3

Iced-Tea is one of the simplest drinks you will make all summer. The two main ingredients are literally tea and water, any additional garnishing is up to you.

1. Traditional Iced-Tea: My rule of thumb is 5-6 tea bags per 2 quarts of water when brewing any kind of tea. Of course, if you want stronger tea feel free to add in more bags! To make traditional iced-tea, first, choose five tea bags from your stash and clip their strings to the side of the pitcher so that the bags are dangling into the center of the pitcher. Bring 2 quarts of hot water to a boil on the stove and pour it into the pitcher, making sure the tea bags are fully covered. Allow the tea to steep for 5-10 minutes, or until the tea is a dark golden color. Remove tea bags, cover the pitcher and place it in a fridge to cool down before drinking.


2. Sun Tea: Since Sun Tea is brewed outside it is important that the container in which you are brewing it is completely sterilized before continuing. Clip five tea bags to your pitcher as directed above. Pour 2 quarts of cool water into the pitcher and place a light cover or a tea towel over the pitcher. Place pitcher in direct sunlight outdoors for one hour. Keep an eye on the tea, when it is dark golden remove it from the sun.
3. Cold-Brewed Tea: Follow the directions above for clipping tea bags to the side of your pitcher. Pour in 2 quarts of cold water, cover the pitcher with a lid and place it in the refrigerator. The tea will need to steep like this for at least 12 hours in the fridge, but will turn out beautifully.

http://healthmad.com/nutrition/top-10-reasons-to-drink-tea/

Building Soup

Soup Building

The Three Opportunities: You can dictate the character of your soup by how you decide to start cooking it.

1. Bold and sturdy flavors come from starting the soup by fast-browning the onions and some of the vegetables in good tasting fat over medium-high heat.

2. Mellow flavors are achieved with slow-stewing onions and key ingredients, like herbs, in a little fat in a covered pot over low heat.

3. Clear, true flavors come from simmering everything in liquid with no pre-sautés.

A Basic Formula:

•2 parts onion
•1/2 part garlic
•2 parts members of cabbage family (cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, etc.)
•1/2 part carrot
•1/4 part celery with leaves
•1/2 part root vegetables (celery root, rutabaga, turnips, etc.)
•1 part leafy vegetables (salad greens, chard, kale, turnip greens, mizuna, dandelion, escarole, endive, collards, etc.)
•1 part dry white or red wine
•Water as needed

Note: Wine is a powerful flavor booster because alcohol opens up flavors that neither fats nor water release. Also, red wine is high in umami, a chemical component of some foods which heightens flavors. So be generous with the wine. Use white wine in pale soups, red in dark ones, and anticipate 1/2 cup for every eight cups of liquid.

No Knead Bread ~ technique

Start here with a discussion on it in the NY Times, "Better Bread with Less Kneading."

Read this one too,"The Secret of Great Bread."

Then watch this video, "No Knead Bread."

And this video, "No Knead Bread Revisited."

The recipe below was found  here.

No-Knead Bread

Adapted from Jim Lahey, Sullivan Street Bakery

Time: About 1½ hours plus 14 to 20 hours’ rising

3 cups all-purpose or bread flour, more for dusting
¼ teaspoon instant yeast or 3/4 teaspoon regular dry yeast
1¼ teaspoons salt
1 1/2 cups water, plus about 1/8 c more
Cornmeal or wheat bran as needed.

1. In a large bowl combine flour, yeast and salt. Add 1 1/2 cups water, and stir until blended; dough will be shaggy and sticky. Cover bowl with plastic wrap. Let dough rest at least 12 hours, preferably about 18, at warm room temperature, about 70 degrees.

2. Dough is ready when its surface is dotted with bubbles. Lightly flour a work surface and place dough on it; sprinkle it with a little more flour and fold it over on itself once or twice. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let rest about 15 minutes.

3. Using just enough flour to keep dough from sticking to work surface or to your fingers, gently and quickly shape dough into a ball. Generously coat a cotton towel (not terry cloth) with flour, wheat bran or cornmeal; put dough seam side down on towel and dust with more flour, bran or cornmeal. Cover with another cotton towel and let rise for about 2 hours. When it is ready, dough will be more than double in size and will not readily spring back when poked with a finger.

4. At least a half-hour before dough is ready, heat oven to 450 degrees. Put a 6- to 8-quart heavy covered pot (cast iron, enamel, Pyrex or ceramic) in oven as it heats. When dough is ready, carefully remove pot from oven. Slide your hand under towel and turn dough over into pot, seam side up; it may look like a mess, but that is O.K. Shake pan once or twice if dough is unevenly distributed; it will straighten out as it bakes. Cover with lid and bake 30 minutes, then remove lid and bake another 15 to 30 minutes, until loaf is beautifully browned. Cool on a rack.

Yield: One 1½-pound loaf.

Flavor Detonators ~ technique

Pan Tossing Technique

All About Eggs

This weeks we are watching a series of demos at Rouxbe on "How to Cook Eggs" in every way you can think of.

In this section you will learn how to cook eggs just like a professional chef. Watch close-up instructional egg cooking videos and learn how to cook eggs sunny up, over easy, poached and finally, learn how to cook perfect scrambled eggs. We will even show you the techniques you need to make perfect egg omelets.

Aside from breakfast eggs, eggs also play an important role in many of the dishes that we prepare and eat every day. Yet, despite their importance in cooking, many people don’t know a lot about eggs. So, we've also included some instructional videos on egg basics as well as videos on how to determine egg freshness and how to store eggs. From here, you can jump into a number of quick and easy egg recipes to test out your new knowledge. It won't be long before you are an expert with how to cook eggs.

Let’s get cracking; shall we?

There are also a number of You Tube Demos that can be watched:

Technique: Sauce Bechamel

The Five Technique: French Mother Sauces: The Mother of all Resources

Presented wonderfully by Chef Jacob Burton through his online free culinary school. This is an informative and help resource so be sure to bookmark his site.

I love the podcasts!!!! This is a rare find.

Fried Rice ~ technique

Basically you can add in whatever you want. Mise en place is extremely important for this.