Wizard Recipes

It helps, of course, that you can eat your fill of whole grains and actually feel virtuous. (How many foods can  you say that about?) Eating a variety of grains is the most enjoyable way not only to add lots of daily fiber to your diet but also to steer away from over refined carbohydrates.

There is a type of grain to fit every cooking situation. Some-like couscous and bulgur-require only steeping in boiling water for a few minutes, while others simmer without any attention for anywhere from 10 minutes to more than an hour. And none of this should be intimidating..

The Basics of Grains

Almost all grains are grasses and therefore have the same basic composition: If you were to look at a single grain and work from the outside in, you would first see the bran, very thin but tough layers that protect the interior.

Next comes the germ, which is the embryo at the base of the grain, and the endosperm, which makes up the bulk of the grain and provides food for the germ. We sometimes eat the bran and germ, which contain the most nutrients and fiber, as well as the oil that makes grains perishable, but all parts of most grains are edible, though rice, barley, and oats have an additional protective outer layer, an inedible husk or hull that must be removed before being eaten.

Milling

The process of removing parts of grains to make them edible or (by some standards) more palatable is called  milling. When only the hull is removed from a grain kernel, it retains its bran and germ and is called brown, as in brown rice, or whole, as in whole oats (or, for that matter, whole wheat, which can be eaten with no milling at all).

The less grains are milled, the higher they are in both  nutrients and flavor, and the longer they take to cook. This is a trade-off and a choice. (You can precook and have the best of all worlds-convenience, flavor, and nutrition.) Highly milled grains, like white rice, pearled barley, and rolled oats, contain just the endosperm, the white or light tan interior of the grain, containing little more than starch and protein.

They’re not as nutritious as whole grains, like wheat, oats, barley, quinoa, and rye-which have more fiber, micronutrients, and protein-but they’re faster cooking, a characteristic that’s easy to like.

Buying and Storing Grains

Though whole grains are increasingly available in supermarkets, your best shopping bets remain specialty supermarkets, natural food stores, and places that sell a lot of foods in bulk. International markets may be the only sources in your area for grains like farro, millet, and hominy. Mail-order and on-line shopping also offer a wide selection.

Stored in a cool, dry place, white rice, for example, will keep almost indefinitely. Brown rice and other whole grains are more sensitive; the natural oils in the bran and germ can turn rancid. Since you never know how long they’ve already been sitting on the store shelf, brown rice and other whole grains are best stored in the refrigerator, or even your freezer if possible. (No need to defrost before use.) I try to buy relatively small amounts (a pound or so) of many, many grains and use them within a year or so.

Rinsing and Draining Grains

Grains are cleaned in the milling process, so you don’t need to pick through them as you do beans. But because rice may have been coated with talc, quinoa may retain a bit of its natural saponin (a slightly bitter compound), and any grain may be gritty, I like to rinse them before cooking.

Swish them in a strainer under cold running water or put them in the pot you’re going to use, fill it with water, swirl the grains around, then pour off the water; repeat until the water is clear. You need not drain the grains well if you’re just going to boil them, but you should if you’re making pilaf, risotto, or similar dishes.

It helps to keep a variety of rices in your pantry at all times, as they make an easy side dish and are used in many types of cooking across the world. Keep rice in its original packaging until opening, then store it in an airtight container at room temperature.

I liked to write cooking instructions for each and affix them to the lid of the container for handy reference (for example, “combine 1 cup water,  1 / 2 cup rice, and  1 / 2  teaspoon salt; cook 25 minutes”). For best results, use within a year.

Arborio rice: When properly prepared, this shortgrain Italian rice develops a creamy texture and a chewy center and has an exceptional ability to absorb flavors, making it ideal for risotto. Carnaroli is similar in starch content.

Basmati rice: With its slender long grains, basmati is prized for its delicate nutty aroma. It is an essential element of Indian cooking.

Brown rice (medium- to long-grain) is the entire grain of rice with only the inedible husk removed. The nutritious, high-fiber bran coating gives it its light tan color. When cooked, brown rice has a strong, nutty flavor and chewy texture. Medium-grain brown rice is starchier than the long-grain variety.

Jasmine rice: This long-grain rice has the aroma of basmati but the softer, starchier texture of mediumgrain rice. It is ideal for serving with Thai curries.

Sushi rice: Japanese sushi rice is a short-grained, glutinous white rice that becomes moist, firm, and sticky when cooked. If you can’t find Japanese sushi rice, substitute short-grained white rice (called pearl).

White rice (medium- to long-grain), which has been stripped of the husk and bran, has a mild flavor and firm texture, making it a versatile vehicle for carrying the flavor of other ingredients. Medium-grain is a little stickier than the long-grain variety.

Converted white rice, which is made by soaking, pressuresteaming, and then drying unhulled grains, takes slightly longer to cook than unconverted white rice; it also has a pale tan color. Instant or quick white rice has been fully or partially cooked before being dehydrated and packaged; this should not be substituted in recipes.

White rice (short-grain, or pearl): The fat, almost round grains of short-grain white rice have a higher starch content than medium- and long-grain rice. They become moist and viscous when cooked, causing the grains to stick together. Also called glutinous rice (even though it is gluten-free), this variety is most often used in Asian cooking.

Wild rice is actually the seed of a grass found in the Great Lakes region of the United States. It is harvested by hand and it has a nutty flavor and chewy texture, making it particularly good in rice salads and stuffings. Although wild rice can take up to an hour to cook, it is important to watch it carefully toward the end; overcooking produces starchy results.

SALT

The two most common types are kosher (coarse) salt and table (iodized) salt. Kosher salt is a good choice for cooking (and brining) and for use at the table. Since coarse salt does not contain any additives or iodine, it has a cleaner flavor and is not as strong or sharply acidic as table salt; it also dissolves quickly in cold water.

When seasoning foods, the larger grain of coarse salt make it easier to control the amount you use (and the saltiness of the dish). In most recipes, these salts can generally be used interchangeably, without altering amounts, though you may prefer to use table salt for baking.

If you want to add a more distinctive accent to dishes, consider one of the many types of sea salts.Fleur de sel, one of the rarest and most prized of sea salts, comes from the Brittany region of France; it has a mild salty taste and is best used as a condiment, sprinkled over salads, egg dishes, fish, and other foods at the table.

Gray salt also hails from Brittany, and has a stronger saltiness. Maldon, an English sea salt, consists of small white crystalline flakes that can easily be crushed with your fingers and added to dishes as they cook or once they are at the table. Sundried sea salts also come from Sicily and Maine; they are perfect for garnishing the rims of cocktail glasses.

A few failures can intimidate anyone, yet cooking rice to perfection, once you learn it, is one of the easiest and most fool-proof kitchen tasks, next to boiling water. Remember one thing-rice cooking leaves very little latitude for errors or carelessness.

Learn a good rice cooking technique, practice it and stick with it (pun unintended). You’ll invariably end up with fluffy, perfectly-cooked rice grains that are neither dry nor soggy or sticky. And if it is sticky rice you are after, you will get the stickiest, gummiest rice that stays on your chopsticks in good-size lumps instead of two or three grains at a time.

Have a rice-cooking marathon to get thoroughly familiar with the technique. Get a pound or two ( a kilo) of rice and play hooky from work for a couple of hours. Start with the recipe here, then vary your technique to suit your taste until you judge the finished product perfect for your taste and your purposes.

Rice cooking varies slightly depending on your water, variety of rice, humidity (i.e. how much moisture rice grains retain) and how hot your lowest burner setting is. And some people like rice slightly al dente, others soft. Keep cooking batches of rice until you have exactly the way you like it, noting for each batch the amount of water you used and cooking time. It is a very cheap lesson, since rice is so inexpensive, and it only takes a few hours.

Feed your dog or cat any poor results and tell them that all Asian pets live mainly on rice. They don’t know the difference between good and bad rice and it is good for them (many canned cat and dog food filler is rice).

Each cookbook’s rice cooking technique is different. One variable, the amount of water to use so the rice absorbs the last drop at the end of the cooking period, changes with the age of the rice. Younger rice has a higher moisture content, so use slightly less water. But virtually all rice we buy has passed the young-rice stage.

The large variety of cooking techniques probably originated in Asia. There are many Asian rice-eating nations, and each culture prefers a different end result. Many people in parts of Asia prefer a long-grain, fluffy, dry rice. But even these people don’t agree on their cooking techniques.

In Pakistan, India, Burma and Sri Lanka they cook rice with salt.In Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia and Vietnam they cook it without salt. Going further east, Cambodia, Korea, China and Japan prefer a medium or short-grain variety that cooks up fluffy but moist with the grains sticking together. They add no salt to the water. In Laos, they eat glutinous rice as the everyday staple, not just in sweet preparations.

In Western cookbooks, the recommended cooking time for white rice varies from 15 to 30 minutes. Your guess is as good as anyone’s why this broad range.

Another area of complete disagreement is whether to rinse the rice before cooking.Asians often do this simply because their rice is not pre-cleaned. With better processing techniques clean rice is now available more readily in Asia. Rice we buy in the U.S. is always clean and you save a step by not rinsing it before cooking.

Another argument for pre-rinsers is to remove any surface starch that would make the cooked rice sticky. Rinsing advocates swear that rinsing until the water runs clear (starch in the rinsing water turns it milky) gives the fluffiest, driest, least sticky grains possible. Non-rinsers argue that rinsing washes away most of the nutrients, particularly the three B vitamins. Nutritional researchers agree. Laboratory experiments confirmed that much of the valuable vitamins end up in the rinse water with extensive rinsing.

So do you want vitamin-rich rice or non-sticky rice?

To settle the controversy, I cooked identical rice in identical pots, one after a thorough rinse and one straight from the bin. I found no perceivable difference in stickiness or in any other culinary properties between the two pots of cooked rice. My recommendation-don’t rinse the vitamins away and save an unnecessary step.

There are three different ways to cook rice in your kitchen (not including the rice cooker). One way is to cook it like pasta, in plenty of boiling salted water. When it is cooked, pour water and rice into a colander, drain well and serve. This is not the easiest, and much of the nutrients in the rice end up in the cooking water. But the method is foolproof.

Then you can . Combine rice, measured water and salt, and bake, tightly covered, in a 350°F (180°C) oven for 25 to 30 minutes (if you are using brown rice, give it an hour). Uncover and let bake for a few more minutes to evaporate any residual moisture. Simple.

The best and easiest method is the absorption (some cooks call it steaming) method. Put unrinsed rice into measured boiling salted water, cover, turn the heat low and cook for 15 minutes. Then let the pot sit covered, off the heat for 5 minutes. The proportions are 1 cup rice, 1½ cups water and ½ teaspoon salt. Fluff gently with two forks and the rice is ready to eat. This amount serves four people.

If you are cooking more than one cup of raw long-grain rice, for each additional cup of rice you only add 1¼ cups of water, not 1½. The amount of salt remains ½ teaspoon for every cup of rice. For short-grain rice the cooking technique and amount of water is the same, but for each additional cup of rice add only 1 cup of water.

Brown rice takes longer to cook because of the fibrous bran layer that cover the grains needs longer time to soften. The amount of water and salt are the same as for long-grain rice. Most brown rice cooks in 40 minutes.

Glutinous rice is not cooked in water but steamed. I don’t know the reason, possible it is tradition. The less common Asian variety, black glutinous rice, on the other hand, they always cook in water.

Both the absorption method and oven cooking rice, by the way, retain all nutrients.

To continue our journey through the secrets of fish and seafood, I continue my article by mentioning the proper way of consuming fish and seafood in order to attain a healthy nutritious meal!

How to associate fish and seafood… the right way! :

- Due to the low calorie content, you must associate fish with rice, potatoes or vegetables of any kind to make it a complete nutritious meal

- lemon juice contributes to a better protein digestion and increases iron absorption

- if you’re consuming ‘fish from a can’, use only the ones with own juice, not oil added. It’ s a lot healthier!

- try not to stir fry the fish

-cook it in the oven, sauté, in aluminum foil or grilled

- cook the seafood with tomato juice, wine boiled and well seasoned. Don’t add a heavy graving or mayo

- smoked or dried fish contains a lot less calories that the normal one.

- fresh fish must have: sparkling eyes and firm meat

Also remember that :  - there are two types of fish: Low fat and fatty(salmon, tuna, sardines)

- there are two types of seafood: Mollusks (oysters, clams, octopus )and Crustaceans (shrimps, crabs, lobsters)

Here are some tips and tricks for successful cooking!

• when making a BBq, grease the grill a little bit so that it doesn’t stick to it. In order to remain juicy,

don`t poach the meat, and add salt when you serve it (or prepare the marinate  and leave it to soak

up for 24 hours for best results).

• Leave the steaks to rest for 4,5 minutes before cutting!
• Cut the steaks before you put them on the plate!

• The water for cooking spaghetti must be boiling before you add them. Also, you can add a little bit of butter or oil to prevent sticking to the pot.

• Rice gets cooked faster if kept in cold water before.

• Potatoes for mashed potatoes remain white during cooking with you add a little bit of vinegar in the water.

• Use warm milk for preparing the mashed potatoes, to give it a plus of flavor.

• Cook the soup at a small flame, to keep it clear.

• Mushrooms don`t go dark when cooked, if soaked for 5 minutes with water and vinegar.

• Grated apples remain white if sprinkled with a little bit of lemon juice.