Foodwhirl

Top cupcakes with fondant (valentine’s version)

How to Roast Broccoli

Today’s inspiration is from @stayfordinner. I love roasted vegetables… and over at Can You Stay For Dinner, the hostess waxes poetic about the joys of broccoli, before providing a lovely tutorial on how to roast it yourself. Go see. Broccoli, all by her lonesome dove, is my favorite vegetable. She’s filling and fibrous, unfussily fancied or dressed down. I’d proclaim her the best vegetabl…

How to Stuff Burgers: Bacon and Blue Cheese

A few weeks ago we had an impromptu grilling party with friends, and these were the burgers we made.  They were such a hit, I figured you guys might like to see how to make them!  This is a quick technique that can be used to spice up any type of burger…  but in this case, we used blue cheese and crumbled bacon. Tip: Use a kitchen scale to get perfectly sized burgers. Approx 6.5 oz of hamburger meat makes a nice…

Pizza Dough

We’re taking a couple of days off for the holidays, so we’re running a few old posts from when we first launched back in February! -ed For Christmas my Mom gave me a book called Kneadlesly Simple (by Nancy Baggett).  The following is her recipe for Neapolitan Pizza Dough.  It’s really good and really easy, but it’s not a quick recipe so make sure to make this well ahead of when you wan…

How to Fry Eggplant

It seems most people have a love-hate relationship with vegetables, but my love of eggplant started early with this fabulous side dish.  While not the healthiest dish  (it is fried), it’s quite tasty and a kid-friendly way to introduce these lovely vegetables. This isn’t something I make often, but I do love it as an occasional treat, and it’s a great alternative to french fries!  You…

How to peel ginger root

If you ever cook with ginger, you know how much of a difference it can make to use fresh ginger root instead of that dried powder stuff. The tricky part about using fresh ginger, though, is peeling it. It’s so bumpy and irregular that if you try to use a knife to cut away the skin and knobs, you’ll end up left with a small rectangle of gingery goodness and a lot of waste on the cutting board. That is, of c…

How to Prepare a Cheese Tray

Welcome again to Jennifer Locklin of Jane Deere!  For the third in her “Techniques” series (although I’d say this qualifies for “Entertaining” as well!), she has brought us a great writeup on making your own cheese board.  I must admit all those cheeses available can be quite overwhelming, and I love how she’s broken it all down for us.  So, do you want to know how to throw a wine &a…

How to Make Temarizushi (ball-shaped sushi)

Foodwhirl fave La Fuji Mama has a how-to on making temarizushi (ball-shaped sushi). I’ve never tried this, but it looks like a great appetizer idea! I made temakizushi (cone-shaped hand rolls) to order and salmon temarizushi (ball-shaped sushi). I love temarizushi. Not only are they fun and easy to make (especially with my handy-dandy little trick that I’m going to share with you), but they make a…

How to Freeze Greens

Welcome again to Jennifer Locklin of Jane Deere!  For the second in her “Techniques” series, she brings us all the info we’d need to freeze greens for future use.  This swiss chard she’s working with here is just lovely.. she’s lucky enough to have grown her own, but you could of course use greens from your local farmers market or CSA box, if you’re thumb isn’t quite so green…

How to Cook Perfectly Boiled Eggs

Please welcome Jennifer Locklin of Jane Deere! We love her blog (we featured her Chicken Tikka Masala the other day), and this is the first in a series of “Techniques” posts from her.. so stay tuned!  See the whole series. Looking for the perfect hard, medium, or soft-cooked egg? It’s really very simple…just follow along with the photos below (or click on any photo to see larger a…