On February 26 at 1 pm EST, ChefsLine members and guests will talk live with Barbara Beery of BatterUp Kids. You don’t need to be a chef or a cooking teacher to start cooking with your kids at home! Whatever your child’s age and no matter your own cooking skills, cooking together is a creative experience that makes important family memories. To learn how and get started, join us and learn from the nation’s leader in Kids Cooking.

To register online, please visit our Events page.

Chef Barbara Beery has shared her top reasons why cooking with your kids is such an important family affair. What follows are her lessons learned from her 15 years of experiences teaching children and their families to cook.

Tips from the Kitchen of Barbara Beery and Batter Up Kids Culinary Center
by Barbara Beery
The benefits of teaching children to cook are numerous, but the most important one is spending quality time at home with your children. Cooking is highly creative, non-competitive and gives children a big helping of self-esteem. Some other good reasons for cooking with your children include:

It’s an important part of a healthy lifestyle:

It’s a life skill:

Enhances academics - Reading, math, science, history and geography:

Great for self-esteem:

 

 Salty Sauce Audio Class [1:33m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Kathy in Jupiter has accidentally over-salted her marinara sauce, and she wants to know if there is any way to save it.

You certainly can save it, Kathy, although you will need a new game plan. We’re very sorry this happened to you. The easiest thing to do may be to scrap the sauce and begin again, but, if you are like most cooks, that option just seems unbearable, especially if you have put time, care and money into it.

What you want to do if you choose to stick by your sauce is use the sauce you have as a base for more sauce, either now or in the future. You can do this by simply adding more of all of your other ingredients until the right taste is achieved, but that would likely mean multiplying your recipe by 3: there are 3 teaspoons in a tablespoon, so you have essentially tripled the salt in your sauce and will need to triple the rest of the ingredients as well to bring it back. Obviously, this method may involve making more sauce than you are prepared to serve or store in your freezer.

What to do then? Make a paste out of your sauce. Push the salty sauce through a sieve, or screen, or process through a food mill. Then return it to the pot and cook over low heat for 2-3 hours, stirring occasionally to prevent sticking, until it has reduced to a paste texture. Allow to cool and separate into 3 portions. Each one of these 3 portions can act as a base for your sauce - use one third of it now to make a new sauce, and save the other two in the freezer until the next time you want to make a marinara, or pomodoro, or red pepper sauce.

With a minimum of adjustment to your original game plan, you can often make hurtles in the kitchen work for you. Remember to try and have fun with all of your new homemade tomato paste. Also, don’t hesitate to call ChefsLine for one-on-one instruction while cooking. We’ll teach you how to prepare an authentic marinara and how and when to season a sauce properly. Put the recipe aside and let’s just cook up a sauce that suits your taste buds!

Blind baking refers to pre-baking, usually pastry, before adding a filling. Most chefs blind bake pastry when the filling is very moist, baking time is short, and to make the crust sturdier. For many crusts, pre-baking also results in a crisper end product. Sylvia from Oak Hill has a recipe that asks for a “blind baked” shell. Sylvia, if your recipe includes a filling that is itself not baked along with the crust, then remove your crust from the pan before filling. Also, feel free to call our pastry chefs at ChefsLine, 1-800-977-1224, if you would like to review your recipe and baking process with us.

Some tips for blind baking include:

“Dock” your crust. Using a fork, poke holes every inch along the bottom of the pan. These holes will help steam escape and keep your pastry even.

Weight your pastry. Place parchment paper on top of your crust. Spread dry beans or pastry weights over the pan.

 

 Guacamole Audio Class [1:23m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Listen now to Chef Erika Connell Cooper tell ChefsLine@5 member, Chana, how to keep her avocado dip green. In addition to Chef Erika’s tips, here are two ChefsLine recipes for guacamole from our Recipe pages.

Homemade Chips & Guacamole
Chef Adam Cutsinger

INGREDIENTS
4 avocados
1/4 cup grated red onion
1 jalapeno pepper
1/8 cup lime juice
1/8 cup olive oil
1 cup diced tomato
1/2 cup sour cream
salt to taste
15 corn tortillas
3 cups corn oil

METHOD
Whip the avocados, onion, pepper, lime juice, olive oil, tomato, sour cream and salt in a medium-sized bowl until smooth. Cover completely with plastic wrap, making sure to cover the entire surface area of the guacamole to prevent any air from coming into contact with it. Let set in refrigerator. Heat the corn oil in a small sauce pan. Cut the tortillas into 6 pieces each, like a pie. With a wide slotted or perforated spoon or skimmer, lower a handful of the chips into the oil. Turn regularly to make sure they cook equally throughout. When they are golden brown, use the same tool to remove them from the oil and lay them onto a plate covered with a rack or paper towel. Salt them immediately while they are still wet with oil. Repeat with more chips until they are all evenly cooked. Serve with guacamole. You may opt to slice limes or cilantro as a garnish.

Jackie’s Tailgate Guacamole
Chef Jackie Lee

INGREDIENTS
4 Haas avcados
1/2 red onion, small dice
1/4 cup cilantro leaves, finely chopped
2 roma tomatoes, small dice
1 garlic clove, finely minced
juice of 2 lemons to taste
1/2 jalapeno pepper, minced
salt to taste

METHOD
Prepare and set aside onion, cilantro, tomatoes, garlic, lemon, and jalapeno. Cut avocados lengthwise and peel. Remove pit. Using a tablespoon, scoop avocado into a medium sized bowl. Using a wire whisk, mash avocados until broken into “chip-sized” pieces. Add the rest of ingredients and mix. Guacamole can be refrigerated for up to one hour before serving. Cover completing with plastic wrap. You may add one pit to the container to help prevent browning although proper storage and lemon juice will do the trick.

NOTE
From the Chef: Select dark, almost black Haas avocados. The fruit should be yielding to the touch but not mushy. Refrigerate avocados for an hour before preparing. Use enough lemon to make the guacamole tart but not lose the creamy texture. You do not need to remove the jalapeno seeds but do taste the jalapenos before adding to control heat.

Read ChefsLine’s most recent newsletter featuring the Kitchen Quickie Menu.

Read Now

Coq Au Vin is an incredibly easy special occasion meal - especially for wintry nights. Three of our chefs highly recommend Mark Bittman’s recipe.

Some options for your dish related to this recipe:

1. If you prefer to use only chicken breasts, leave bone-in and halve.
2. Consider removing the lid and regulating the heat as much as possible to create a thicker sauce.
3. If your sauce appears too thin, add a roux (equal parts butter and flour quickly cooked together on stovetop) to the sauce in small amounts.
4. The recommended recipe does NOT include fried bacon strips (or pancetta) which is a great and traditional option. To add bacon, cut 4 strips of bacon into 1 inch pieces and fry the bacon over medium heat until crisp. Remove with a slotted spoon, and set aside on a paper towel. Add 2 Tbsp of butter (or canola oil rather than olive oil) to the pot before searing your chicken. You can throw the bacon into the pot at the end of cooking.
5. Coq Au Vin is a great one pot dish, use a dutch oven or heavy casserole.
6. Use a Burgundy wine.

We hope you enjoy preparing this French classic chicken stew. Please note that Chefs Cary Wolfson and Chef Julie Riordan are accomplished French chefs who would be happy to talk you through your dish and provide you with step by step instructions while you’re cooking. Just give us a call at the Culinary Hotline at 1-800-977-1224.

PS If you would like to prepare an equally delish French stew less wine centric and perhaps more appropriate for an “everyday” meal, Chef Julie has a perfect recipe for Chicken Bouillabaisse. Just let us know and we will share her exclusive chef recipe with you.

Thanks for writing to ChefsLine@5 Robert from Ohio!

 

 Romantic Menu Audio Class [4:13m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Listen below to Chef Kevin Weeks’ suggested menu for an easy, impressive, and most importantly, a romantic meal for Sara from Alabama.
We’re always here for on-demand cooking advice and instruction - just call 1-800-977-1224.

SARA’S MENU

Avocado Balsamica
Sliced avocado dressed with balsamic vinegar and a touch of salt and pepper and placed on a bed of greens. Prepare 15 minutes before serving.

Individual Beef Wellingtons with Blue Cheese
Prepare steaks, and if you enjoy mushrooms then the “duxelles” one day in advance. Wrap beef and duxelles in store-bought pastry and bake 1 hour before serving. Link to preferred recipe: Easy Beef Wellington

Glazed Carrots with Lemon and Mint
See Chef Kevin’s Recipe Online. Vegetables can be “prepped” the day before. Listen to our audio class on how to best store your vegetables.

Mashed Potatoes with Horseradish
Visit Chef Kevin’s Blog for This Recipe
Can be prepared one day in advance. See Do-Ahead Mashed Potatoes for ChefsLine tips on preparing great mashed potatoes.

Chocolate Cheesecake

It’s fairly safe to say that chocolate is the most popular dessert item in the world. Many people, however, are allergic to chocolate, or to one of the common ingredients in chocolate products. Erika in Lansing bakes chocolate cakes and chocolate chip cookies, but her mother is unable to enjoy these confections because of her chocolate allergy. Is there anything they can do?

In a word: carob. Carob has been embraced as the “unchocolate” for a long, long time, both by people allergic to chocolate as well as by people seeking a more healthy alternative. Unlike chocolate, it contains no caffeine, phenylethylamine or theobromine, which have several side effects, and it is naturally sweet, so most carob products contain less sugar than chocolate products. Carob products of all varieties are available, including powder, chips, bars, candies, etc., and can be used to directly substitute any of their chocolate counterparts in recipes.

So don’t hesitate to make carob cake, frost it with carob frosting, or make carob chip cookies. Mom, and everyone else, will love them. Have fun baking!

Amy in Miller is roasting round steaks in mushroom soup in electric roasters for 85 people. How hot should she set the roasters? And how long should she roast them?

Whether using an electric roaster or an oven, roasting meat in liquid is a technique called braising. You may be making a stew, or preparing a creamy gravy for the meat. It’s always a good way to go, especially if you need to feed a big crowd.

You may want to brown the meat in a saute pan before putting it in the soup. It will give you a more complex and pleasing flavor. Try dredging the meat in flour first, to seal in the juices, assist in carmelization, and to thicken the sauce. Your round steak will cook quickly if it is cut thin, and may be halfway done when you brown it. Remove the browned meat from the pan and deglaze the pan by adding the moist ingredients and scraping the pan with a spatula to loosen the carmelized morsels left behind by the meat.

Set your roaster to 300F. You will want at least a cup of liquid for every pound of meat. Roast it for 3-4 hours, or at least until the thickest part of the meat reaches 165F. Bon appetit!

Have as much fun cooking as your guests are going to have eating!

 

 Chocolate Bloom Audio Class [0:55m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Listen now to Chef Erika discuss a simple solution to fixing Clare’s problem with her chocolate shortcake. Although her chocolate tastes great, the tempered chocolate coating “blooms” with grey streaks.

Here is some helpful information from the Chocolate Manufacturer’s Association:
Chocolate Bloom Defined
Chocolate bloom is the tell-tale sign that chocolate has not been stored correctly. The most obvious type of bloom, fat bloom, looks like gray-white blotches and streaks on the chocolate and occurs when the chocolate is exposed to heat during storage. Sugar bloom, which leaves the chocolate feeling rough, occurs when the chocolate is stored in damp conditions. Melting and/or tempering bloomed chocolate eliminates the problem, although chocolate affected with sugar bloom should not be melted and used for fine candy making.

Storing Chocolate
Store chocolate at cool room temperature in a dark place with good air circulation; the refrigerator in not recommended although if your kitchen is particularly hot and humid, it might be your only choice. Wrap it well to protect it from odors.

Ideally, chocolate should be wrapped first in foil and then in plastic and stored at a constant temperature of 65°F and 50% humidity. Slightly higher temperatures and humidity are acceptable although the chocolate may not last as long. Stored under perfect conditions, unsweetened and dark chocolate will last for 10 years, and certainly up to a year in good home kitchen conditions; milk and white chocolate for 7 to 8 months.

Formed chocolate candies such as truffles and pralines can be frozen and defrosted in the refrigerator before being brought to room temperature for serving.

Following is an easy, fool proof method for tempering chocolate.

Quick Tempering Method for Chocolate
By Carole Bloom, CCP

METHOD

Chop 1 pound of chocolate into very small pieces and set aside one third of them. Melt the remaining two thirds in the top of a double boiler over hot, not simmering, water, stirring frequently with a rubber spatula to ensure even melting. The chocolate should not exceed 120F (110F for white chocolate). Or melt the chocolate in a microwave-safe bowl on low power for 30 second bursts. Stir the chocolate with a rubber spatula between each burst to make sure it melts evenly.

Remove the double boiler from the heat, then remove the top pan of the double boiler and wipe it dry. Stir in the remaining chocolate in three batches, making sure that each batch is completely melted before adding the next. The finely chopped chocolate will cool the melted chocolate and the warm melted chocolate will melt the chopped chocolate.

When all the chocolate has been added, test the chocolate by placing a dab under your lower lip. If it feels comfortable, not too hot and not too cool, it is tempered. If the chocolate is too warm, stir in more finely chopped chocolate and test again until the chocolate is tempered. There is no need to use a thermometer to register the temperature of the chocolate using this method of tempering.