NUMBER 156 JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019

Weeknight Chicken
and Vegetables
Beef Bulgogi
Korean Marinated Steak

How to Build a
Great Grain Bowl
Best Sautéed
Mushrooms
Secret Ingredient? Water

Essential Guide to
Your Chef’s Knife
Easiest-Ever Biscuits
Break All the Rules

Browned Butter
Blondies
Rich Butterscotch Flavor
˚
Spiced Roasted Chickpeas
Finding the Best Vanilla Extract
CooksIllustrated.com
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Display until February 11, 2019

 JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019
PAGE 10
PAGE 22
2 Quick Tips
Quick and easy ways to perform everyday tasks,
from softening butter for baking to cleaning root
vegetables. COMPILED BY ANNIE PETITO
4 The Original Ragu
You already know ragu rosso, the king of ragu
sauces. But perhaps you haven’t met the queen:
ragu bianco, which, in our version, trades the
tomato for lemon and cream. BY LAN LAM
6 Beef Bulgogi
This popular Korean dish features flavorful strips
of marinated steak that cook in minutes. Bulgogi is
quick enough for a weeknight but also impressive
and fun to serve to company. BY ANNIE PETITO
8 Why You Should Try
Tilapia
We were skeptics, too—until we did our
homework. The facts: Most tilapia is responsibly
raised and features moist, firm flesh with a clean,
mild taste. BY STEVE DUNN
10 Grain Bowls at Home
There’s a reason you order grain bowls at
a counter rather than make them at home:
Preparing multiple unique elements is a project.
But what if you apply some strategy?
BY ANDREA GEARY
America’s Test Kitchen, a real test kitchen located in Boston, is the home of more than 60 test cooks and editors. Our mission is to test recipes until we
understand exactly how and why they work and eventually arrive at the very best version. We also test kitchen equipment and taste supermarket ingredients in
search of products that ofer the best value and lavor. You can watch us work by tuning in to America’s Test Kitchen (AmericasTestKitchen.com) and Cook’s Country from America’s Test Kitchen
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PAGE 20
PAGE 13
13 One-Pan Chicken
and Vegetables
The savory elixir left behind after roasting chicken
is pure gold. We put it to good use.
BY ANDREW JANJIGIAN
14 New-School Sautéed
Mushrooms
Want savory, meaty-textured, deeply browned
mushrooms without a lot of work, time, or even
oil? Start by adding water. BY LAN LAM
16 Getting the Most out of
Your Most Important Knife 26 Do You Need a Burr
A good chef ’s knife is indispensable for all cutting
tasks, from precision work such as mincing a
shallot to heavy-duty jobs such as breaking down
a butternut squash. Here’s how to make sure you
use it to its best advantage.
BY ELIZABETH BOMZE AND KEITH DRESSER
18 Beet Salad in Less Than
an Hour
Want sweet, velvety beets without the wait?
Micro-steam them. BY STEVE DUNN
19 Spiced Roasted Chickpeas
To turn a can of chickpeas into a crunchy, salty
snack, start with a burst of heat.
BY ANDREW JANJIGIAN
20 Easiest-Ever Biscuits
We combine two classic methods (and break a
cardinal rule) to make tender, fluffy biscuits that
come together in record time. BY ANDREA GEARY
PAGE 6
22 How to Make a
Better Blondie
Most blondies have a one-note sweetness and
too many (and the wrong kind of ) mix-ins. We
wanted ours to be chewy, complex, and full of
nutty, butterscotchy goodness. BY ANNIE PETITO
24 In Search of the Best
Vanilla
Cyclones, theft, petrochemicals, market swings—
vanilla is anything but boring. We delve into this
fascinating world and find the best products for
your kitchen. BY HANNAH CROWLEY
Grinder?
Coffee aficionados have long debated the best
brewing method, but is the secret to great coffee
all in the grind? BY LAUREN SAVOIE
28 Ingredient Notes
BY STEVE DUNN, ANDREA GEARY, ANDREW
JANJIGIAN, LAN LAM & ANNIE PETITO
30 Kitchen Notes
BY STEVE DUNN, ANDREA GEARY, ANDREW
JANJIGIAN, LAN LAM & ANNIE PETITO
32 Equipment Corner
BY LISA McMANUS, EMILY PHARES & KATE SHANNON
 E D I T O R I A L STA F F LETTER FROM THE EDITOR
Chief Executive Officer David Nussbaum
Chief Creative Officer Jack Bishop
Editor in Chief Dan Souza
Executive Editor Amanda Agee
Deputy Editor Rebecca Hays
Executive Managing Editor Todd Meier
Executive Food Editor Keith Dresser
COMFORT FOOD
Deputy Food Editor Andrea Geary
Senior Editors Andrew Janjigian, Lan Lam

Y
Senior Content Editors Elizabeth Bomze, Kristina DeMichele ou can’t talk about Korean food without I remember thinking, “Your grandmother cooks
Associate Editors Steve Dunn, Annie Petito talking about jangs,” Seong shouted food like this?”
Photo Team & Special Events Manager Tim McQuinn
Lead Cook, Photo Team Jessica Rudolph
over his shoulder at me as he carefully At her home in rural Maine, my own grandmother
Assistant Test Cooks, Photo Team Sarah Ewald, Eric Haessler diced a carrot into ¼-inch cubes. I was made things such as clam chowder, pork chops with
Senior Copy Editor Jill Campbell a couple of weeks into culinary school, and Seong, homemade applesauce, and biscuits. Her food was
Copy Editor Rachel Schowalter
Senior Science Research Editor Paul Adams
a student from Seoul, South Korea, always delicious and comforting, but
had taken it upon himself to teach bulgogi embodied a whole different
Executive Editors, Tastings & Testings
me about the food he grew up eat- level of complexity. With a cuisine so
Hannah Crowley, Lisa McManus
Senior Editors, Tastings & Testings ing. Between precision knife cuts, utterly different from what I was used
Lauren Savoie, Kate Shannon he explained that jangs—intensely to, South Korea felt like another world
Associate Editor, Tastings & Testings Miye Bromberg
Assistant Editors, Tastings & Testings
savory fermented sauces and pastes entirely.
Riddley Gemperlein-Schirm, Carolyn Grillo, Emily Phares made from soybeans and chiles— From then on, I delved deep into
were the backbone of the cuisine. Korean food. I collected cookbooks,
Creative Director John Torres
Design Director Greg Galvan
I had little experience with Korean discovered restaurants, and cooked
Photography Director Julie Cote food. I peppered him with questions. Korean dishes frequently. Years later, I
Associate Art Director Maggie Edgar
One night after class, Seong cooked made a trip to Seoul to reconnect with
Senior Staff Photographer Daniel J. van Ackere
Staff Photographers Steve Klise, Kevin White his grandmother’s recipes for a group Dan Souza Seong. Seoul is a special city, but the
Photography Producer Meredith Mulcahy of us at my apartment. Along with real thrill was cooking with Seong’s
Director, Creative Operations Alice Carpenter
many other dishes, he made bulgogi, thinly sliced grandparents, learning firsthand how traditional dishes
Senior Editor, Special Projects Christie Morrison marinated rib eye that he stir-fried in a hot skillet. He were made.
Senior Manager, Publishing Operations Taylor Argenzio brought it to the table with a pile of butter lettuce During the weeks that associate editor Annie Petito
Imaging Manager Lauren Robbins
Production & Imaging Specialists Dennis Noble,
leaves, a small bowl of a ruddy-brown paste (a com- spent working on her excellent Korean Marinated
Jessica Voas, Amanda Yong bination of jangs and seasonings), and halved garlic Beef (Bulgogi) recipe on page 7, I was frequently
Test Kitchen Director Erin McMurrer
cloves. He showed me how to smear a dab of the brought back to my first bite of that dish. There’s
Assistant Test Kitchen Director Alexxa Benson
Test Kitchen Manager Meridith Lippard paste on a small lettuce leaf, top it with a warm slice energy and excitement in tasting something com-
Test Kitchen Facilities Manager Kelly Ryan of beef, and crown the meat with a piece of garlic. pletely new to you and puzzling over how the flavors
Senior Kitchen Assistant Shopper Michelle Miller
Senior Kitchen Assistant Receiver Heather Tolmie
He folded the leaf around the contents and told me were created or the textures were achieved. I still cook
Lead Kitchen Assistant Ena Gudiel to pop the bite-size package into my mouth. and eat Korean food a lot, and every time I do, it feels
Kitchen Assistants Gladis Campos, Blanca Castanza, Seong watched as I slowly chewed. The soft let- a little more familiar. I lean on the recipes a bit less. I
Amarilys Merced, Arlene Rosario
tuce quickly gave way, and my teeth sank into the make substitutions to suit my taste or the ingredients
B U S I N E S S STA F F tender-yet-toothy beef. Sweet, meaty juices spilled I have on hand. This once new-to-me cuisine now
onto my tongue, followed by an intense hit of feels personal. And in that I find deep comfort.
Chief Financial Officer Jackie McCauley Ford
Senior Manager, Customer Support Tim Quinn
savory, spicy umami from the paste. Just as the rich-
Customer Support Specialist Mitchell Axelson ness started to peak, I crunched down on the garlic, Dan Souza
and its raw bite provided a contrasting sharpness. Editor in Chief
Chief Revenue Officer Sara Domville
Director, Sponsorship Marketing & Client Services
Christine Anagnostis

Senior Director, Events & Special Projects Mehgan Conciatori

Partnership Marketing Manager Pamela Putprush
Event Coordinator Michaela Hughes
Chief Digital Officer Fran Middleton
VP, Marketing Natalie Vinard
Senior Director, Social Media Marketing Claire Oliverson
Social Media Manager Morgan Mannino
Social Media Coordinators Charlotte Errity, Sarah Sandler
Director, Public Relations & Communications Brian Franklin
Public Relations Coordinator Madeleine Cohen
ILLUSTRATION: JOHN BURGOYNE
FOR INQUIRIES, ORDERS, OR MORE INFORMATION
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JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019

1
 “Exfoliate” Root Veggies A Strategy for Organizing
Dawn Provenncher of Questa, N.M.,
has a new way to speedily clean the
grime from root vegetables such as
QUI CK Food in the Freezer
So that she can easily find what
she’s looking for in her freezer,
potatoes and carrots: She soaks the
vegetables briefly in warm water and
then dons a clean bath exfoliating
TI P S Andrea Price of Grafton, Wis.,
freezes items in zipper-lock bags
and then stores them by type in
glove and rubs away the dirt with her labeled shoe boxes.
gloved hand. j COMPILED BY ANNIE PETITO k

Traveling Tool Kit

Noreen McGovern of Biddeford, Maine, likes to make sure she has a well-equipped
kitchen when she travels for the holidays or rents a home for vacation. She takes
one knife roll (a fabric case with slots to hold knives) packed with her favorite knives
and carries a second knife roll loaded with small tools such as a wooden spoon, a
spatula, a rasp-style grater, a thermometer, and a pair of tongs. All the tools are
neatly packed and easily accessible.

Good Use for That Last

Bit of Honey
Instead of struggling to extract
Soften Butter Under a Hot Glass honey from a near-empty jar, Alicia
When Kimberly Bernards of Robbinsdale, Minn., Connolly of New Britain, Conn.,
Make a Plastic Wrap wants to soften a whole stick of butter for a adds warm water (enough to equal
Pull Tab baking recipe, she uses this trick: Stand the the amount of honey left in the jar)
To make a plastic-wrapped sandwich butter stick on its end. Pour boiling water into and then shakes it up to make a
easy to unwrap, Anne Hender–son a heatproof glass, wait 30 seconds, and then honey “simple syrup.” She stores this
of Blenheim, Ontario, places the discard the water and invert the hot glass over syrup in the refrigerator and uses it
sandwich at a slight angle on a piece the butter. In about 20 minutes, the to sweeten cocktails or iced tea.
of plastic wrap and then rolls up the butter will be properly softened
sandwich until she’s left with a little and ready to use.
piece of extra plastic that can be
twisted to form a tab. When she’s
ready to eat, she can quickly find the
tab and pull it to unwrap the food.

ILLUSTRATION: JOHN BURGOYNE

SEND US YOUR TIPS We will provide a complimentary one-year subscription for each tip we print. Send your tip, name, address, and
telephone number to Quick Tips, Cook’s Illustrated, 21 Drydock Avenue, Suite 210E, Boston, MA 02210, or to QuickTips@AmericasTestKitchen.com.

COOK’S ILLUSTRATED

2
Quick Kiwi Prep How to Clean Doughy Hands
To easily cut up a kiwi, Anita Whenever Juli Lederhaus of Petaluma, Calif.,
Wood of Westford, Mass., has needs to clean flour or dough from her hands,
come up with this fun and effec- she uses cold water instead of hot so the flour
tive method: Cut a kiwi in half doesn’t turn into glue. With cold water, the
crosswise. Take a metal beater floury paste slides right off.
from a hand-held mixer, push it
down into the kiwi, and twist.
The kiwi separates cleanly from
its skin, and you get four neat
wedges per half.

A Powerful Way to Core Cabbage A Better Way to Tear Foil

To easily core a large head of cabbage, Mary Ingles
of North Richland Hills, Texas, uses a power drill.
Using a 1-inch spade tip drill bit, she drills right
through the core of the cabbage until
it’s gone. The cabbage can then
be cut as needed.
To neatly tear aluminum foil or plastic wrap,
Joy M. Suh of Fremont, Calif., pulls out the
length needed from the box, flips the box
upside down so the blade is facing the coun-
ter, and rips it with confidence. She gets a
clean sheet every time.

Hear When Your Pan Is Hot Saving Spilled Spices

When heating oil in a skillet to sauté onions or peppers, John
Connell of Boston, Mass., places one or two pieces of the
chopped food in the pan. The sizzle of the onion or pepper piece
is enough to let him know that the oil is hot. This also avoids the
problem of forgetting that the oil is being heated as he’s prepping
other ingredients.
When measuring spices from the jar, Betsy Dupre of Scituate, Mass., always has some spillage,
which is tricky to neatly scoop up and save (instead of simply sweeping into the trash). To save
the spillover while measuring, she places the plastic lid of a large yogurt or soup container
underneath to catch any spice that falls. She also cuts a notch in the lid’s lip to make a spout.
When she’s done measuring, she bends the lid like a taco to easily pour the spice back into its
container. Plus, the lid can be washed and reused.

JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019

3
 The Original Ragu
You already know ragu rosso, the king of ragu sauces. But perhaps you haven’t met the
queen: ragu bianco, which, in our version, trades the tomato for lemon and cream.
j BY LAN LAM k

M
ention the word “ragu,” lower temperatures, turns to gelatin, and
and a rich, meaty, enhances tenderness, but the muscle pro-
tomato-laced sauce typi- tein doesn’t overcook.
cally comes to mind. But Sure enough, about 2 hours later,
sauces containing tomato are a relatively the meat was supple and fork-tender. I
recent addition to the Italian culinary removed the roast from the pot, let it cool
repertoire, not appearing until the early a bit, and tried to shred it with two forks.
1800s. Long before then, ragu bianco That turned out to be quite a chore with
(a simple, not-too-saucy mixture of any such a large piece of meat, but I ignored
number of chopped or shredded meats, that problem for the moment and tossed
aromatics, and often white wine—but the sauce with pappardelle—wide egg
never tomato) was on the menu. noodles that would pair well with the
Ragu bianco started out as fare for nobil- chunky ragu—along with a bit of the pasta
ity. Beef, pork, or game was stewed, and the cooking water and a few handfuls of grated
deeply savory cooking liquid was used to Pecorino Romano.
dress pasta as one course. Meanwhile, the The large bites of pork were perfect, but
meat was carved and arranged on a platter the rest of the dish was far from it, with a
for a subsequent course. Eventually, this dry texture and little to no lemon flavor. In
style of eating was copied by the gentry, the frank words of a colleague, I’d served up
who used smaller, less expensive cuts. By “the pork version of a bad tuna casserole.”
the late 17th century, the practice had trick-
led down to commoners, who ultimately Fond-ational Flavor
combined the meat and pasta into one dish. I gave it another go, this time halving the
Ragu bianco is still prevalent in Italy, and pork butt crosswise before braising, expect-
the sky’s the limit in terms of how it can be ing that the shorter fibers would be easier
flavored. I was eager to develop my own to shred.
version after enjoying a stunning example Ragu bianco lacks tomatoes, which is what makes it white rather than red. Fixing the wan flavor required a mul-
at Maialino, a restaurant in New York City, tipronged approach. I wanted to develop
featuring large shreds of meltingly tender braised were released. Instead of loosening the fond with more meatiness since the pork wasn’t browning
pork punctuated by tart lemon, licorice-y fennel, and the usual white wine, I deglazed with lemon juice much in the oven. I considered searing it on the
salty Pecorino Romano cheese. When tossed with and water. stovetop before braising, but a simpler solution came
pasta, the sauce formed an incredibly fresh-tasting Next, I nestled a 1½-pound boneless pork butt to mind: Adding a little cured pork to my soffritto
and satisfying dish. roast—a deeply marbled, relatively inexpensive would quickly provide tons of flavor without my
cut from the upper part of the pig’s shoulder that having to sear the pork butt.
A New Spin on Soffritto we often use in pork braises—into the soffritto. I I diced a couple of ounces of pancetta and sim-
Almost all ragus, whether red or white, start with a transferred the pot to a 300-degree oven, where mered it in ⅔ cup of water to draw out its fat and
soffritto—a sautéed mixture that typically includes the pork would spend more than an hour in the juices. When the water evaporated, the meat started
finely chopped onion, carrot, and celery and some- 140- to 190-degree zone. In that temperature range, to sizzle in a layer of meaty pork fat that had collected
times meat. I kept the onion but ditched the carrot collagen breaks down more rapidly than it does at on the bottom of the pot. I sautéed the vegetables
and celery since I planned on using a large fennel
bulb. The fennel would offer an herbaceous sweet- Browned
ness instead of the earthy, mineral-y flavors of carrot Double the Fond, Double the Flavor pancetta
and celery. In our ragu bianco, two rounds of fond development creates first
I softened my soffritto in a Dutch oven with a ensure plenty of rich lavor. First, we simmer pancetta layer
PHOTOGRAPHY: STEVE KLISE

little olive oil and then added fresh thyme and gar-
lic, stirring until the heady scents of the aromatics
S T E P - BY- S T E P V I D E O A N D
N U T R I T I O N I N F O R M AT I O N
CooksIllustrated.com/FEB19
to extract its juices and fat and let that liquid turn into a
deeply savory fond. Then, as the pork shoulder simmers
in the oven, juices and fat spatter onto the sides of the
pot, creating a second layer of fond. To loosen the fond Splattering
pork juices
on the sides, we simply cover the pot for a few minutes
create second
so that steam can soften it. layer

COOK’S ILLUSTRATED

4
 and aromatics in the fat and deglazed with just water,
holding back the lemon juice until later so its delicate
notes wouldn’t be obliterated by the long braise.
To get color on the pork without adding any
extra work, I turned up the oven to 350 degrees.
Since most of the meat sat above the cooking
liquid, I hoped that it would brown at this higher
temperature. Indeed, the pork was tawny, tender,
and juicy after just 1½ hours. What’s more, increas-
ing the temperature had caused the braising liquid
to bubble and splatter onto the sides of the Dutch
oven, forming a second layer of fond (see “Double
the Fond, Double the Flavor”). I pulled the pork
out of the pot to rest, put the lid on for a few
minutes to let the steam loosen the fond, and then
scraped the savory bits from the sides of the pot into
the braising liquid.
To finish the sauce, I stirred in not only the tart
juice of two lemons but also some of their floral
zest. I then shredded the pork—it was indeed easier
with two smaller roasts—and returned it to the
pot. When I tossed the ragu with the pappardelle, I
incorporated a little extra pasta cooking water. The
intensified meatiness and citrusy complexity were
just right, as were the tender shreds of meat. But
the ragu now lacked body.
A Luxe Finish
What was missing? How about butter? Whisking in
a few tablespoons gives a pan sauce body, but with
chunks of pork in the pot, the butter was difficult
to whisk in and the sauce didn’t emulsify properly.
A colleague suggested trying cream instead. I put
together another batch, adding just ⅓ cup of heavy
cream to the pot along with ¾ cup of pasta cooking
water. What a difference! The pappardelle was now
coated with a cohesive, velvety sauce.
In fact, the cream was so stable that I found I
could add it to the ragu at the beginning of cook-
ing and get the same results—a boon since it had
been cooling down the ragu a bit when added just
before serving.
I stirred in plenty of Pecorino before garnishing
the dish with the chopped fennel fronds. Here was a
lively, luxurious ragu bianco—fit for royalty.
UNDERSTANDING AL DENTE
Pasta recipes almost always call for cooking noodles al
dente, meaning they are tender but still irm. But what
exactly happens to dried pasta as it cooks? It helps to
know that dried pasta is a complex network of starch
granules held together by protein. When pasta is
boiled, the starch granules on the surface of the pasta
absorb water and swell, and some eventually burst,
ILLUSTRATION: JAY LAYMAN
releasing starch into the cooking water. The granules
just beneath the pasta’s surface don’t become as
hydrated and merely swell without bursting. Finally, the
starch at the very center of the pasta becomes only
partially hydrated, so the center retains a slightly irm
bite and a faint white core.
PORK, FENNEL, AND LEMON RAGU
WITH PAPPARDELLE
SERVES 4 TO 6 TOTAL TIME: 23/4 HOURS
Pork butt roast is often labeled Boston butt in the
supermarket. To ensure that the sauce isn’t greasy,
be sure to trim the roast of all excess surface fat.
You can substitute tagliatelle for the pappardelle,
if desired.
4 ounces pancetta, chopped
1 large onion, chopped fine
1 large fennel bulb, 2 tablespoons fronds
chopped, stalks discarded, bulb halved,
cored, and chopped fine, divided
4 garlic cloves, minced
1½ teaspoons table salt, plus salt for
cooking pasta
2 teaspoons minced fresh thyme
1 teaspoon pepper
⅓ cup heavy cream
1 (1½-pound) boneless pork butt roast,
well trimmed and cut in half across grain
1½ teaspoons grated lemon zest plus
¼ cup juice (2 lemons)
12 ounces pappardelle
2 ounces Pecorino Romano cheese, grated
(1 cup), plus extra for serving
1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat
oven to 350 degrees. Cook pancetta and ⅔ cup
water in Dutch oven over medium-high heat, stirring
occasionally, until water has evaporated and dark
fond forms on bottom of pot, 8 to 10 minutes. Add
onion and fennel bulb and cook, stirring occasion-
ally, until vegetables soften and start to brown, 5 to
7 minutes. Stir in garlic, salt, thyme, and pepper and
cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds.
2. Stir in cream and 2 cups water, scraping up any
browned bits. Add pork and bring to boil over high
heat. Cover, transfer to oven, and cook until pork is
tender, about 1½ hours.
3. Transfer pork to large plate and let cool for
PASTA WITH MINIMAL CORE
Cooked just right
JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019
5
TECHNIQUE
HOW TO FINELY CHOP A
FENNEL BULB
We use the same technique to cut a fennel bulb
as we do to cut an onion. Start by removing any
stalks and fronds from the top of the bulb and
trimming a thin slice from the base. Then halve
the bulb lengthwise and remove the core from
the base of both halves.
3
2
3
1
2
1
1. Using sharp chef ’s knife, make several evenly
spaced horizontal cuts into fennel bulb, taking
care not to cut through root end.
2. Holding knife perpendicular to counter, make
several vertical cuts, cutting up to but not through
root end.
3. Evenly slice fennel across previous cuts.
15 minutes. Cover pot so fond will steam and soften.
Using spatula, scrape browned bits from sides of
pot and stir into sauce. Stir in lemon zest and juice.
4. While pork cools, bring 4 quarts water to boil
in large pot. Using 2 forks, shred pork into bite-size
pieces, discarding any large pieces of fat or connec-
tive tissue. Return pork and any juices to Dutch
oven. Cover and keep warm.
5. Add pasta and 1 tablespoon salt to boil-
ing water and cook, stirring occasionally, until al
dente. Reserve 2 cups cooking water, then drain
pasta and add it to Dutch oven. Add Pecorino and
¾ cup reserved cooking water and stir until sauce
is slightly thickened and cheese is fully melted, 2 to
3 minutes. If desired, stir in remaining reserved
cooking water, ¼ cup at a time, to adjust sauce
consistency. Season with salt and pepper to taste
and sprinkle with fennel fronds. Serve immediately,
passing extra Pecorino separately.
R E C I P E S TO M A K E I T A M E A L
Find these recipes in our archive: Pan-Steamed
Broccolini with Shallot (March/April 2018) and
Best Almond Cake (January/February 2014).
 Beef Bulgogi
This popular Korean dish features lavorful strips of marinated steak that cook in minutes.
Bulgogi is quick enough for a weeknight but also impressive and fun to serve to company.
j BY ANNIE PETITO k

W
hen I first tried bulgogi (liter-
ally “fire meat”) at a Korean bar-
becue restaurant not too long
ago, I immediately fell in love—
not just with the dish but the whole experience.
Diners used chopsticks to spread thinly sliced
beef, wet with a sweet soy marinade, across a hot
grill in the center of the table. The meat sputtered
and hissed, and after a few minutes was lightly
browned and cooked through. Each diner then
piled a few pieces into a lettuce leaf, spooned on a
deeply savory chile sauce, wrapped up the lettuce
into a package, and ate it. Rice was served along-
side to help balance the intense flavors, along with
an array of different sauces and pickles collectively
known as banchan.
Eating in this communal way, with each person
customizing their own bites of the dish, was fun and
convivial. It’s no wonder that bulgogi is one of the
most popular dishes in Korea, at restaurants and at
home. I couldn’t wait to re-create the experience
in my kitchen. Tuck pieces of the beef inside a lettuce leaf and top them with a dab of spicy ssamjang. Kimchi, white rice, and
pickled daikon radish are eaten alongside.
A Cut Above the Rest
Tender and/or fatty cuts are common for bulgogi then froze them for 35 minutes before slicing them containing soy sauce, garlic cloves, sugar, toasted
so that the thin slices, which end up fairly well-done, thin. As I worked, the steak was transformed into sesame oil, and pepper; tossed it with the meat;
don’t turn tough or dry. Popular choices include rib an impressively large, wispy pile of shaved meat (see and let it sit for 30 minutes.
eye, sirloin, tenderloin, and skirt steak. After tasting “One Steak, Four Servings”). It was now time for I cooked the slices (without wiping off the
all the cuts side by side, we chose rib eye for its rich the marinade. marinade, per tradition) in a nonstick skillet over
beefiness and generous marbling. moderately high heat, let them sit for a minute to
Traditionally, the steak for bulgogi is sliced Balancing Act brown slightly, and then stirred until they were no
razor-thin, and we’ve found that partially freezing The marinade for bulgogi skews sweet, but in longer pink, just a few minutes longer.
the meat makes this task much easier. I divided a addition to sugar, it contains a good amount Unfortunately, this beef had a sweetness that
single rib-eye steak into 1½-inch-wide pieces and of soy sauce and garlic. I put together a batch screamed teriyaki, not bulgogi. I decreased the
sugar from 6 tablespoons to 4, increased the soy
sauce from 2 to 3 tablespoons, and for savoriness,
Punch Up Your Pantry with These Korean Staples doubled the garlic cloves to four and added ¼ cup
Our bulgogi recipe features three mainstays of Korean cuisine that can be used in all sorts of ways. of chopped onion—an ingredient I had seen in some
KIMCHI: In Korea, this accompaniment is on the table at breakfast, lunch, and dinner. There are hundreds of bulgogi recipes. I pureed the mixture (also common)
variations, but the best-known type, which is tangy and spicy, is made of salted and then marinated and cooked the beef as before.
fermented napa cabbage and seasoned with chili powder, garlic, ginger, and Much better: The sweetness was still apparent, but
scallions. Add it to grain bowls, stir-fries, scrambled eggs, burgers, hot dogs, or much more tempered. PHOTOGRAPHY: CARL TREMBLAY
grilled cheese.
GOCHUJANG: This thick, sweet, savory, and spicy paste is made from Treat It Right
gochugaru (Korean chile lakes), dried fermented soybean powder, sweet rice The meat tasted great and wasn’t dry, but it was a
powder, salt, and sometimes sugar. Use it in Korean Fried Chicken, marinades, bit chewy, since the thin pieces couldn’t help but be
or dipping sauces or to pep up soups, stews, and even deviled eggs. cooked well beyond medium-rare. Many bulgogi
A POWERFUL TRIO
DOENJANG: Fermented soybeans give this coarse-textured, miso-like, salty, Keep doenjang, gochujang, and recipes address this issue by including certain fruits
rich paste a slight sourness. Use as a replacement for miso in soups, stews, and kimchi on hand for authentic such as pear for the enzymes they contain that sup-
dressings or as a coating on meats, ish, or tofu. Korean flavor. posedly tenderize meat. But I found that tossing
the beef with baking soda (our go-to treatment

COOK’S ILLUSTRATED

6
 for tenderizing meat) and letting it sit for a few
minutes before marinating it was more effective, as
pear and other fruits turned the surface of the meat
mushy (for details, see “Try a Little Tenderness
[But Not Too Much]”).
But I had one more question about the marinade:
The test kitchen learned long ago that marinades
do most of their work on the meat’s surface, and
my thin slices were nearly all surface. What’s more,
the beef was cooking directly in its marinade. Was
soaking the slices for 30 minutes superfluous? When
tasting three batches—one marinated for 30 min-
utes, one for 15 minutes, and another just before
cooking—no one could detect a difference. A quick
soak just before cooking was the way to go.
I cooked up another batch of meat, this time
adding a handful of scallion greens during the last
30 seconds for freshness and a vibrant green color.
The salty-sweet beef was ultratender and moist.
Party Time
Finally, I turned to the banchan. First up was the
traditional savory chile sauce ssamjang to dab onto
the meat. I combined minced scallion whites with
two potently flavored Korean pantry staples made
from fermented soy beans: sweet, savory, and spicy
gochujang and salty, rich doenjang (see “Punch
Up Your Pantry with These Korean Staples”). I
also added sugar, garlic, toasted sesame oil, and a
little water to loosen its consistency. Then, for a
crisp, pungent element, I soaked daikon radishes
in vinegar, salt, and sugar for 30 minutes to create
a quick pickle.
With steamed rice, lettuce leaves, and kimchi
to go with the tender beef, spicy sauce, and tangy
pickles, I had a fun, satisfying meal that I couldn’t
wait to share.
KOREAN MARINATED BEEF (BULGOGI)
SERVES 4 TOTAL TIME: 1¼ HOURS
To save time, prepare the pickles and chile sauce
while the steak is in the freezer. For information on
daikon, see page 28. You can substitute 2 cups of
bean sprouts and one cucumber, peeled, quartered
lengthwise, seeded, and sliced thin on the bias, for
the daikon, if desired. It’s worth seeking out the
Korean fermented bean pastes doenjang and gochu-
jang, which are sold in Asian markets and online.
If you can’t find them, you can substitute red or
white miso for the doenjang and sriracha for the
gochujang. You can eat bulgogi as a plated meal
with steamed rice and kimchi or wrap small portions
ILLUSTRATION: JOHN BURGOYNE
of the beef in lettuce leaves with chile sauce and eat
them like tacos.
Pickles
1 cup rice vinegar
2 tablespoons sugar
1½ teaspoons table salt
1 pound daikon radish, peeled and cut into
1½-inch-long matchsticks
ONE STEAK, FOUR SERVINGS
Sliced paper-thin and served with rice and other accompaniments in bulgogi,
a single rib-eye steak is plenty to serve four people.
DIVIDE AND FREEZE A RIB EYE TURN PIECES THINLY SLICE
Cut rib-eye steak crosswise into ONTO CUT SIDE Use sharp knife to shave meat as thin as
1½-inch-wide pieces. Trim exterior and Stand each piece on possible against grain. Precise slicing isn’t
interior fat. Freeze until very firm to cut side to expose grain. necessary—it’s more important that the
make slicing easier. slices are thin than that they are perfect.
Chile Sauce (Ssamjang) 5. Heat vegetable oil in 12-inch nonstick skillet
4 scallions, white and light green parts only, over medium-high heat until shimmering. Add beef
minced mixture in even layer and cook, without stirring, until
¼ cup doenjang browned on 1 side, about 1 minute. Stir and continue
1 tablespoon gochujang to cook until beef is no longer pink, 3 to 4 minutes
1 tablespoon water longer. Add scallion greens and cook, stirring con-
2 teaspoons sugar stantly, until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Transfer to
2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil platter. Serve with pickles and chile sauce.
1 garlic clove, minced
Beef Try a Little Tenderness
1 (1¼-pound) boneless rib-eye steak, cut (But Not Too Much)
crosswise into 1½-inch-wide pieces and trimmed Many bulgogi marinade recipes include pear or
1 tablespoon water kiwi—fruits that contain enzymes that suppos-
¼ teaspoon baking soda edly tenderize the meat. To test their tenderizing
¼ cup chopped onion efects for ourselves, we added ½ cup each
¼ cup sugar of crushed pear and crushed kiwi to separate
3 tablespoons soy sauce batches of our marinade and soaked slices of
4 garlic cloves, peeled rib-eye steak in each for 30 minutes. We also
1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil tossed more sliced steak in our go-to tender-
¼ teaspoon pepper izer—a solution of baking soda and water—for
2 teaspoons vegetable oil 5 minutes (since baking soda works on contact,
4 scallions, dark green parts only, cut into longer isn’t necessary) and then stir-fried all
1½-inch pieces three samples per our recipe.
While the baking soda–treated batch cooked
1. FOR THE PICKLES: Whisk vinegar, sugar, up perfectly moist and tender, the pear- and
and salt together in medium bowl. Add daikon and kiwi-marinated meat cooked up mushy on the
toss to combine. Gently press on daikon to sub- surface. That’s because the tenderizers work
merge. Cover and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes diferently: Whereas baking soda tenderizes by
or up to 24 hours. unraveling and separating the meat’s protein
2. FOR THE CHILE SAUCE: Combine all strands, the powerful fruit enzymes (calpain in
ingredients in small bowl. Cover and set aside. pear; actinidain in kiwi) snip the protein strands
(Sauce can be refrigerated for up to 3 days.) into smaller pieces that yield
3. FOR THE BEEF: Place beef on large plate a mushy efect. We’ll stick
and freeze until very firm, 35 to 40 minutes. Once with baking soda when we
firm, stand each piece on 1 cut side on cutting board need to tenderize meat.
and, using sharp knife, shave beef against grain as
USE BAKING SODA, NOT
thin as possible. (Slices needn’t be perfectly intact.)
A FRUITY MARINADE
Combine water and baking soda in medium bowl. Baking soda leaves meat
Add beef and toss to coat. Let sit at room tempera- nicely tender, not mushy.
ture for 5 minutes.
4. Meanwhile, process onion, sugar, soy sauce,
garlic, sesame oil, and pepper in food processor until S T E P - BY- S T E P V I D E O A N D
smooth, about 30 seconds, scraping down sides of N U T R I T I O N I N F O R M AT I O N
bowl as needed. Add onion mixture to beef and toss CooksIllustrated.com/FEB19
to evenly coat.
JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019
7
 Why You Should Try Tilapia
We were skeptics, too—until we did our homework. The facts: Most tilapia is
responsibly raised and features moist, irm lesh with a clean, mild taste.
j BY STEVE DUNN k

U
ntil recently, tilapia was not whole side of the fish. Half the fillet is the
a fish that ever came up in thinner belly portion, and the other half is
our weekly discussion of the thicker portion beneath the dorsal fin.
potential recipes to develop. The thick half was resting flat on the pan and
We had a vague idea of it as being a browning nicely, but the thin half, tilted up
second-rate, predominantly farm-raised by the thick side, hardly made contact at all.
fish with a muddy taste, so why even As I stared at four more fillets on my
go there? Then we learned that tilapia is cutting board, an answer presented itself. A
now the fourth-most-consumed seafood natural seam runs the length of each fillet,
in the United States (after shrimp, tuna, separating the thin belly from the thicker
and salmon) and decided that it was time portion. I ran my knife along the seams to
to take a closer look. A tilapia fact-finding split the fillets. Then, still working in two
mission ensued: We scoured the internet batches, I sautéed the four thick halves
for information and started experiment- together before proceeding with the four
ing in the test kitchen. Boy, were we ever thin halves. That did the trick: Freeing
wrong about this fish. Tilapia has a whole the thin pieces gave them full contact with
lot going for it, including a strong rec- the pan, allowing them to turn a deep
ommendation from a leading consumer golden brown, and cooking the thick and
watchdog group (see “Three Reasons to thin halves separately let me tailor the cook-
Love Tilapia”). ing time to suit the thickness of each.
The flesh of tilapia, a freshwater fish, is
firm and moist, with a clean, mild—not at Reeling It In
all muddy—flavor, sort of a cross between But the high heat I was using caused a
trout and flounder. In fact, tilapia is so problem: As I browned the first batch of
appealing that when we included it in a fillets, they shed a bit of the flour into
blind tasting of five types of white fish, the skillet. By the time the second batch
it landed in second place, only one point We cook tilapia over high heat to develop deep golden browning with crisp went in, those flour particles were starting
shy of tying for the win (see “How Good spots. Our bright Cilantro Chimichurri complements the lean fish. to burn, producing scorched flavors and
Is It? Tilapia versus Other White Fish”). smoking up the kitchen. I didn’t want to
Given that stellar showing and the fact that tilapia is With that question answered, I was ready to cook have to wipe out a hot pan between batches, so I
so reasonably priced—it runs only about $8.95 per the fish. I salted another batch of fillets and blotted ran a quick test without the flour dredge to see if it
pound—we saw no good reason not to cook with it. them dry with paper towels before giving each one
a dip into all-purpose flour, a technique we com-
TILAPIA, THICK AND THIN

PHOTOGRAPHY: CARL TREMBLAY; ILLUSTRATION: JOHN BURGOYNE

Dividing and Conquering monly use to accelerate browning. As I proceeded
I dove right in, eager to file this magazine’s first tilapia to cook the lightly coated fish in two batches in
recipe. I knew that flavorful browning would enhance an oil-slicked nonstick skillet over medium heat, I
the fillets’ delicate taste, so a simple stovetop sauté noticed yet another likeable trait: Whereas most thin
seemed like the best way to go. Because it had been fish fillets are fragile and demand a gentle touch,
a while since we developed a recipe for relatively thin denser tilapia didn’t flake apart, so it was easy to
white fish fillets, I wondered if I should apply lessons maneuver in the pan.
we’ve learned from cooking salmon. These days we Unfortunately, moderate heat failed to brown
usually brine or salt salmon before cooking; it seasons the fish in the few short minutes it took to reach
the flesh and helps it retain moisture, which benefits 130 degrees, the doneness temperature we found
even a fatty fish. Indeed, when I quickly sautéed both ideal for tilapia. In a subsequent test, I cranked the Tilapia is a small ish, so a illet comprises one
tilapia that I’d salted for 15 minutes and unsalted heat up to high and was pleased to find that the sturdy whole side of its body. The belly portion of the
tilapia, the former was moister and better seasoned. tilapia could withstand this aggressive approach. illet is thinner than the top portion, a disparity
After just 2 to 3 minutes per side, some deep golden that leads to uneven cooking. Our solution: Using
S T E P - BY- S T E P V I D E O A N D browning developed. But it wasn’t uniform. the seam running down the center of each illet
N U T R I T I O N I N F O R M AT I O N Only half of each fillet was taking on color; the as a guide, cut the thin and thick portions apart
CooksIllustrated.com/FEB19 other half emerged from the pan pale as could be. and cook them separately.
That’s because tilapia are small, so a single fillet is a

COOK’S ILLUSTRATED

8
 How Good Is It? Tilapia versus Other White Fish
By the time we’d inished developing our tilapia recipe, we were converts: Its mild taste and moist, irm lesh are hard to beat. Even so, we were intrigued by a blind
tasting the Washington Post staged in its oices a couple of years back comparing tilapia to seven other varieties of ish. The tasting panel included renowned D.C. chef
Scott Drewno, Post food critic Tom Sietsema, and a isheries expert, among others. Not only did tilapia come in second, but Chef Drewno, formerly a tilapia detractor,
declared it his favorite.
We decided to conduct our own blind tasting, comparing tilapia to four other common white ish: lounder, branzino, haddock, and snapper. The ish arrived
ultrafresh from our seafood purveyor in a single delivery, and we prepared all the illets according to our Sautéed Tilapia recipe, adjusting cooking times as necessary to
ensure that all the illets reached 130 degrees. Here again, the tilapia did not disappoint. With its “yummy,” “moist,” and “meaty, mild taste of luxury,” it earned a strong
second place, missing a tie for irst place (with haddock) by just one point.
2ND
PLACE

HADDOCK TILAPIA BRANZINO RED SNAPPER FLOUNDER

($12.95/lb) ($8.95/lb) ($18.95/lb) ($25.95/lb) ($15.95/lb)

was really necessary. It wasn’t: The high heat alone
was sufficient to get the fillets remarkably browned
and even lightly crisp in spots.
The fish was top-notch with just a squeeze of
lemon, but I felt that a rich finishing touch would
give it a little more oomph. I came up with a unique
compound butter seasoned with savory miso, tart
lemon, and oniony chives and an olive oil–based
chimichurri featuring fresh cilantro and parsley.
Spooned onto the hot-from-the-pan tilapia, the
toppings added aromatic pops of flavor.
At long last, here is a great recipe for tilapia. We’re
sorry we waited so long.
SAUTÉED TILAPIA
SERVES 4 TOTAL TIME: 35 MINUTES
You can use fresh or frozen tilapia in this recipe (if
frozen, thaw before cooking). There is no need to
take the temperature of the thin halves of the fillets;
they will be cooked through by the time they are
golden brown. If desired, you can omit the lemon
wedges and serve the fish with Chive-Lemon Miso
Butter or Cilantro Chimichurri (recipes follow). Our
recipes for Sautéed Tilapia with Chive-Lemon Miso
Butter for Two and Sautéed Tilapia with Cilantro
Chimichurri for Two are available for free for four
months at CooksIllustrated.com/feb19.
4 (5- to 6-ounce) skinless tilapia fillets
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
Lemon wedges
PHOTOGRAPHY: © GETTY/PAULRDUNN
occasionally to distribute oil, until undersides are
golden brown, 2 to 3 minutes. Using thin spatula,
flip fillets. Cook until second sides are golden brown
and tilapia registers 130 to 135 degrees, 2 to 3 min-
utes. Transfer tilapia to serving platter.
3. Return skillet to high heat. When oil is just
smoking, add thin halves of fillets and cook until
undersides are golden brown, about 1 minute.
Flip and cook until second sides are golden brown,
about 1 minute. Transfer to platter and serve with
lemon wedges.
CHIVE-LEMON MISO BUTTER
SERVES 4 TOTAL TIME: 10 MINUTES
We like the delicate flavor of white miso in this
recipe, but red miso can be substituted. Dot Sautéed
Tilapia with miso butter before serving.
2 tablespoons white miso
1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
plus 2 teaspoons juice
⅛ teaspoon pepper
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
2 tablespoons minced fresh chives
Combine miso, lemon zest and juice, and pepper
in small bowl. Add butter and stir until fully incor-
porated. Stir in chives and set aside.
Three Reasons to Love Tilapia
Tilapia had a bad reputation for muddy lavor, but new
CILANTRO CHIMICHURRI
SERVES 4 TOTAL TIME: 20 MINUTES
Briefly soaking the dried oregano in hot water and
vinegar before combining it with the remaining
ingredients helps soften it and release its flavor. Top
Sautéed Tilapia with ¼ cup of chimichurri before
serving and pass the remaining chimichurri separately.
2 tablespoons hot water
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1 teaspoon dried oregano
½ cup minced fresh parsley
¼ cup minced fresh cilantro
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 teaspoon kosher salt
¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes
¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil
Combine hot water, vinegar, and oregano in
medium bowl; let stand for 5 minutes. Add parsley,
cilantro, garlic, salt, and pepper flakes and stir to
combine. Whisk in oil until incorporated.
R E C I P E S TO M A K E I T A M E A L
Find these sides in our archive: Toasted Orzo with Peas
and Parmesan (May/June 2003) and Sautéed Swiss
Chard with Garlic (May/June 2015).

farming techniques have improved the quality of this inex-

1. Place tilapia on cutting board and sprinkle pensive freshwater ish. Here’s what you should know:
both sides with salt. Let sit at room temperature for IT TASTES GREAT: Modern aquaculture systems
15 minutes. Pat tilapia dry with paper towels. Using produce meaty tilapia with a mild lavor.
seam that runs down middle of fillet as guide, cut IT’S NUTRITIOUS: Tilapia illets are low in fat and high
each fillet in half lengthwise to create 1 thick half in protein.
and 1 thin half. IT’S SUSTAINABLE: The sustainable seafood adviser
2. Heat oil in 12-inch nonstick skillet over high Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch lists tilapia
heat until just smoking. Add thick halves of fillets as a Best Choice.
to skillet. Cook, tilting and gently shaking skillet

JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019

9
 Grain Bowls at Home
There’s a reason you order grain bowls at a counter rather than make them at home:
Preparing multiple unique elements is a project. But what if you apply some strategy?
j BY ANDREA GEARY k

A
rchaeological evidence sug- Trending Toward Greatness
gests that humans have been On to the vegetables and salmon. Stovetop
eating from bowls for at least techniques would be inefficient since they
20,000 years. But never have require a certain amount of babysitting.
bowls been as trendy as they are now. Roasting, however, is mostly hands-off and
Noodle bowls, breakfast bowls, veggie would leave me available to check more
bowls, taco bowls, and more (what’s a tasks off my list. As I thought about ways to
Buddha bowl?) are all big sellers in the crank out two or three components at once,
fast-casual dining scene, and I can see another trend came to mind: sheet-pan
why: In a single vessel, you get a healthful, meals. Loading multiple ingredients onto
vibrant mix of complementary flavors and a single baking sheet would be a fuss-free
textures. Everything mingles as you eat, way to cook items in tandem.
creating a uniquely satisfying experience. I decided on shiitake mushrooms and
I particularly enjoy bowls built around carrots; both would be tender in about
grains: Heaped onto a base of earthy, nubby 20 minutes as long as I cut the carrots thin.
kernels, you’ll typically find some cooked The vegetables would need more time in
vegetables, a protein, a potent dressing, a the oven than the salmon, so I would give
pickled element, and a crunchy garnish. them a head start at 500 degrees before low-
I knew that creating a grain bowl from ering the heat and adding the salmon fillets.
scratch would be a project. After all, what I tossed the carrots with oil and salt and
makes a bowl so appealing is that it offers six spread them on one half of a baking sheet.
or seven distinct components. Sure enough, I gave the shiitake mushroom caps a similar
when I made my first one in the test kitchen, treatment, adding some water to the mix so
hours went by—and there were mountains that steam would jump-start their cooking,
of dishes to wash. But I was rewarded with a before spreading them out on the other half
terrific (and terrifically varied) meal. of the sheet.
If I could streamline the process, I might Hoisin-glazed salmon, nutty brown rice, and roasted carrots and shiitakes After 10 minutes, the carrots and mush-
just be able to turn grain bowls into a rea- team up with gingery pickled cucumbers in this Asian-inspired bowl. rooms were starting to soften and brown,
sonable at-home endeavor. As I considered so I removed the sheet from the oven and
the challenge, timelines and opportunities for multi- chewy texture make it ideal for a bowl. It was also pushed the vegetables to either side, making room
tasking swirled in my head. I was thinking less like a appealing because it can simply be boiled and drained in the center of the sheet for four salmon fillets that
cook and more like a project manager. rather than simmered via the more finicky absorp- I had brushed with hoisin sauce to create a sweet
tion method, which requires a prescribed amount of glaze. I returned the sheet to the oven, which I had
Goal Setting liquid. Rice and salmon work well with a variety of turned down to 275 degrees, for 10 minutes—just
Before diving in, I drafted a mission statement of seasonings; here, I decided to go for an Asian spin. enough time to gently cook everything through.
sorts: Efficiency and organization would be key—sec- I’d work out the remaining details
ond only to great taste, which is always paramount. as I went along. The bowls had to be healthful Recycle, Reuse
The bowls had to be healthful and colorful. I would Taking roughly 30 minutes Things were humming right
use as few ingredients as possible (repurposing ingre- to prepare, rice was the most
and colorful. I would use as along. The only remaining ele-
dients would help achieve that goal) and as little time-consuming element of the few ingredients as possible ment was the dressing, which
equipment as I could get away with. Finally, I wanted dish. I put a pot of water on to meant I needed oil and acid. I
to develop several recipes to suit varied tastes. boil, and while it heated, I wasted
and as little equipment as glanced at my workstation, spot- PHOTOGRAPHY: CARL TREMBLAY
I outlined a vision for my first bowl. The protein no time getting started on the I could get away with. ting the cucumbers soaking in
would be salmon: It fit in nicely with my guidelines pickled element. Making pickles is lightly sweet vinegar. There was
of speed, ease, and healthfulness. Brown rice seemed a profitable undertaking if there ever was one. They the acid. To give the vegetable oil for the dressing
like a good choice for the grain; its nutty taste and require almost no work—just a bit of time—yet the some personality, I sizzled sliced scallion whites and
flavor payout is huge. I simply sweetened white vin- ginger in it just for 30 seconds until their aromas
S T E P - BY- S T E P V I D E O A N D egar with a little sugar, enlivened it with grated fresh were released.
N U T R I T I O N I N F O R M AT I O N ginger, and then stirred in sliced cucumber. I set the As I waited for the infused oil to cool, I realized
CooksIllustrated.com/FEB19 cukes aside to soak, put the rice into the now-boiling that the next time around, I could maximize pro-
water, and continued to work. ductivity by making the scallion-ginger oil before

COOK’S ILLUSTRATED

10
 Grain Bowl Flowchart
We wanted a recipe whose multiple components could be prepared in a single cooking session. To keep the time to about an hour, we strategized to ind eiciencies:
We repurposed ingredients in multiple applications, chose straightforward cooking methods, roasted three ingredients in tandem on a single baking sheet, and started
long-cooking items early to allow for multitasking.
1. PREPARE ITEMS THAT NEED TO COOL
MAKE INFUSED OIL
OR FRY GARNISH;
LET COOL
2. START PREPARING TIME-CONSUMING COMPONENTS
PUT WATER MAKE
FOR GRAINS QUICK PICKLES;
ON TO BOIL LET SOAK
3. COOK REMAINING COMPONENTS AND MAKE DRESSING
BOIL GRAINS; ROAST
DRAIN WHEN 2 VEGETABLES
TENDER AND 1 PROTEIN
anything else. It could cool as I prepared other items,
and then it would be ready to go when it was time
to mix the dressing.
I carried on, combining a few tablespoons of the
pickling liquid with the oil and a little more of the
hoisin sauce that I’d just painted onto the salmon.
I took a taste: With very little work, I’d achieved a
deeply complex, sweet-tart dressing.
Ready for assembly, I pulled out four shallow
bowls. To avoid any dry grains, I tossed the rice
with some of the dressing before arranging the
hoisin-glazed salmon, roasted shiitakes and carrots,
and gingery cucumbers on top. More dressing and
showers of toasted sesame seeds and sliced scallion
greens finished the bowl with final layers of crunch
and freshness. I would pass sriracha at the table for
those who liked a spicy kick. This bowl was every-
thing I’d hoped for, and I’d pulled it off in about
an hour.
With my maximum-efficiency bowl complete,
I used my template to create three more: another
Asian-inspired bowl featuring honey-sriracha tofu
and bulgur; a chicken and brown rice bowl with
Southwestern accents such as chipotle, lime, and
pepitas; and a final bowl combining farro and sau-
sage with roasted broccoli rabe, red peppers, and
pickled grapes.
Grain Bowls, Now or Later
Each of our grain bowl recipes makes four
ILLUSTRATION: JAY LAYMAN
servings. Serve them all at once, or pack up
the components separately and you’ll have the
makings of two meals for two—or four meals
for one—ready at a moment’s notice to eat at
home or take on the go. The bowls are equally
good served hot or at room temperature.
USE OIL IN DRESSING
USE PICKLING
LIQUID IN
DRESSING
MAKE
DRESSING
Mission accomplished: Here were four hearty but
light, great-tasting bowls that didn’t require tons of
ingredients, time, or equipment.
BROWN RICE BOWL WITH
VEGETABLES AND SALMON
SERVES 4 TOTAL TIME: 1¼ HOURS
If your knife is too dull to cut through the salmon
skin, try a serrated knife. It is important to keep the
skin on during cooking; once the salmon is cooked,
the skin will be easy to remove. Toast the sesame seeds
in a dry skillet over medium heat until fragrant (about
1 minute), and then remove the skillet from the heat
so the seeds won’t scorch. Our recipe for Farro Bowl
with Vegetables and Sausage is available for free for
four months at CooksIllustrated.com/feb19.
¼ cup vegetable oil, divided
3 scallions, white and green parts separated
and sliced thin on bias
2 teaspoons grated fresh ginger, divided
⅓ cup distilled white vinegar
1 tablespoon sugar
1¾ teaspoons table salt, divided, plus salt for
cooking rice
1 English cucumber, quartered lengthwise,
seeded, and sliced on bias ¼ inch thick
1¾ cups short-grain brown rice
1 pound carrots, peeled and sliced on bias
½ inch thick
1 pound shiitake mushrooms, stemmed,
caps larger than 2 inches halved
1 (1-pound) skin-on salmon fillet, about
1½ inches thick at thickest part
4 teaspoons hoisin sauce, divided
1 tablespoon sesame seeds, toasted
Sriracha (optional)
JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019
11
ASSEMBLE
BOWLS
1. Adjust oven rack to lowest position and heat
oven to 500 degrees. Heat 2 tablespoons oil in large
saucepan over medium heat until shimmering. Add
scallion whites and 1½ teaspoons ginger and cook,
stirring constantly, until fragrant, about 30 seconds.
Transfer scallion mixture to small bowl.
2. Bring 6 cups water to boil in now-empty
saucepan. While water is coming to boil, whisk
vinegar, sugar, ¾ teaspoon salt, and remaining
½ teaspoon ginger in medium bowl until sugar is
dissolved. Add cucumber and stir until coated. Set
aside, stirring occasionally.
3. Add rice and 1 teaspoon salt to boiling water.
Reduce heat and simmer until rice is tender, about
30 minutes. Drain rice well and return it to saucepan.
Cover and set aside.
4. While rice is cooking, toss carrots with 1 table-
spoon oil and ½ teaspoon salt. Spread in even layer
on half of rimmed baking sheet. Toss mushrooms
with 2 tablespoons water, remaining 1 tablespoon
oil, and remaining ½ teaspoon salt and spread
in even layer on other half of sheet. Roast until
vegetables are just beginning to soften and brown,
about 10 minutes.
5. While vegetables are cooking, cut salmon in
half. Halve each piece crosswise to create 4 equal
pieces. Make 2 shallow slashes about 1 inch apart
along skin side of each piece, being careful not to
cut into flesh. Brush flesh side of each piece with
½ teaspoon hoisin.
6. Reduce oven temperature to 275 degrees and
remove sheet. Push vegetables to either side to clear
space in middle of sheet. Carefully place salmon, skin
side down, in clearing. Return sheet to oven and
roast until vegetables are tender and browned and
centers of fillets are still translucent when checked
with tip of paring knife and register 125 degrees (for
medium-rare), 10 to 12 minutes.
 7. Measure out ¼ cup cucumber liquid and add
to scallion mixture. Whisk in remaining 2 teaspoons
hoisin. Stir 2 tablespoons dressing into rice.
8. Spoon rice into 4 wide bowls. Place 1 piece of
salmon on top of rice. Arrange carrots, mushrooms,
and cucumbers in piles that cover rice. Drizzle
salmon and vegetables with remaining dressing.
Sprinkle with sesame seeds and scallion greens. Serve,
passing sriracha separately, if using.
BULGUR BOWL WITH VEGETABLES
AND MARINATED TOFU
SERVES 4 TOTAL TIME: 1¼ HOURS
Stop cooking the shallots once they turn light golden
brown; they will continue to darken and crisp as they
cool. Arranging the broccolini in a pile instead of
spreading it out on the baking sheet creates textural
contrast and prevents the broccolini from drying out.
5 tablespoons vegetable oil, divided
3 shallots, sliced into thin rounds
1¾ teaspoons plus pinch table salt, divided,
plus salt for cooking bulgur
3 tablespoons sriracha, divided
2 tablespoons honey, divided
14 ounces firm tofu, cut into ¾-inch cubes
½ cup rice vinegar
1½ cups thinly sliced red cabbage
1 pound carrots, peeled and sliced on bias
½ inch thick
1 pound broccolini, trimmed and cut into
1-inch pieces
1¼ cups medium-grind bulgur
2 tablespoons mayonnaise
1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat
oven to 425 degrees. Heat ¼ cup oil and shallots in
large saucepan over medium heat, stirring constantly
once shallots start to sizzle. Cook until shallots are deep
golden, 6 to 10 minutes. Drain shallots in fine-mesh
strainer set over medium bowl; reserve oil. Transfer
shallots to paper towel–lined plate and sprinkle with
pinch salt. (Do not wash saucepan or strainer.)
2. Whisk together 2 tablespoons sriracha, 1 table-
spoon honey, and ½ teaspoon salt in second
medium bowl. Add tofu and gently toss until evenly
coated. Cover and refrigerate. Combine vinegar,
½ teaspoon salt, and remaining 1 tablespoon honey
in third medium bowl. Microwave until simmering,
1 to 2 minutes. Add cabbage and stir until coated.
Set aside, stirring occasionally.
3. Toss carrots with 1½ teaspoons oil and ¼ tea-
spoon salt and spread on half of rimmed baking
sheet. Toss broccolini with remaining 1½ teaspoons
oil and remaining ½ teaspoon salt and pile on other
half of sheet. Roast until carrots are tender and broc-
colini is crisp in spots, 15 to 20 minutes, stirring
vegetables halfway through roasting.
4. While vegetables are roasting, add 6 cups water
to now-empty saucepan and bring to boil over high
heat. Add bulgur and 1 teaspoon salt to boiling
water. Reduce heat and simmer until tender, about
5 minutes. Drain bulgur in fine-mesh strainer and
return it to saucepan. Cover and set aside.
5. Measure out 2 tablespoons cabbage liquid and
add to reserved shallot oil. Whisk in mayonnaise and
remaining 1 tablespoon sriracha. Mix 3 tablespoons
dressing into bulgur.
6. Spoon bulgur into 4 wide bowls. Arrange
tofu, carrots, and broccolini in piles that cover
bulgur. Using fork, lift cabbage out of liquid
and divide evenly among bowls. Drizzle tofu and
vegetables with remaining dressing. Sprinkle with
shallots and serve.
SOUTHWESTERN BROWN RICE BOWL
WITH VEGETABLES AND CHICKEN
SERVES 4 TOTAL TIME: 1½ HOURS
For a spicier grain bowl, add the larger amounts of
jalapeños and chipotle. There is no need to thaw the
corn before cooking.
2 (6-ounce) boneless, skinless chicken breasts,
trimmed
2 teaspoons table salt, divided, plus salt for
cooking rice
½ cup distilled white vinegar
2 tablespoons lime juice
1 tablespoon sugar
1 small red onion, halved and sliced thin
1–2 jalapeño chiles, stemmed and sliced into thin
rings
3 poblano chiles, stemmed, seeded, and cut
into 1-inch pieces
2 tablespoons vegetable oil, divided
3 cups frozen corn
1½ cups long-grain brown rice
3 tablespoons mayonnaise
2–3 teaspoons minced canned chipotle chile in
adobo sauce
1 ripe avocado, halved, pitted, and cut into
½-inch pieces
¼ cup roasted, salted pepitas
COOK’S ILLUSTRATED
12
1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat
oven to 450 degrees. Place chicken breasts in center
of 20- by 12-inch sheet of heavy-duty aluminum foil.
Sprinkle ⅛ teaspoon salt evenly over each side of each
breast. Bring short sides of foil together and crimp to
seal tightly. Crimp remaining open ends of packet,
leaving as much headroom as possible inside packet.
Refrigerate for at least 20 minutes.
2. Combine vinegar, lime juice, sugar, and
½ teaspoon salt in medium bowl. Microwave until
simmering, 1 to 2 minutes. Add onion and jalapeños
and stir until coated. Set aside, stirring occasionally.
3. Bring 6 cups water to boil in large saucepan.
While water is coming to boil, toss poblanos with
1 tablespoon oil and ½ teaspoon salt. Spread in even
layer on half of rimmed baking sheet. Toss corn with
remaining ½ teaspoon salt and remaining 1 table-
spoon oil and spread in even layer on other half of
sheet. Roast until poblanos begin to soften and corn
begins to brown at edges, about 10 minutes.
4. Add rice and 1 teaspoon salt to boiling water.
Reduce heat and simmer until rice is tender, about
25 minutes. Drain rice well and return it to saucepan.
Cover and set aside.
5. While rice cooks, stir corn and poblanos and
push to either side of sheet to create clearing in cen-
ter. Place foil packet in clearing and return sheet to
oven. Cook until vegetables are tender and browned
and chicken registers 160 degrees, 18 to 20 minutes.
Carefully open packet, transfer chicken to cutting
board, and let rest for 3 minutes. Halve each breast
lengthwise, then slice crosswise ½ inch thick. PHOTOGRAPHY: CARL TREMBLAY
6. Transfer ¼ cup onion liquid to small bowl. Add
mayonnaise and chipotle and whisk until smooth. Stir
3 tablespoons dressing into rice.
7. Spoon rice into 4 wide bowls. Arrange avocado,
chicken, poblanos, corn, and pickled onion and jala-
peños in piles that cover rice. Spoon 1 tablespoon
dressing over each portion of chicken and drizzle
remaining dressing over corn and poblanos. Sprinkle
with pepitas and serve.
 One-Pan Chicken and Vegetables
The savory elixir left behind after roasting chicken is pure gold. We put it to good use.
W
hen you roast bone-in, skin-on
chicken breasts in a skillet, fat
renders from the skin, juices
seep from the flesh, and bits of
meat stick to the pan. These tidbits crackle and
brown, creating a concentrated, chicken-y infusion.
Tradition dictates that you use these drippings to
whip up a pan sauce. But that’s wasting an oppor-
tunity to make a one-pan meal. Why not cook a
vegetable in them to create a rich, savory side? Add
crusty bread and a bottle of wine and you’re done—
with just one pan to wash.
I started by peeling back the chicken skin so I
could season the flesh with salt; I then repositioned
the skin. To ensure that the skin would end up fully
rendered, I wanted to kick-start that process by sear-
ing the chicken on the stove before transferring it to
the oven. I turned to a technique we’ve used success-
fully in the past: I placed the chicken skin-side down
in a cold skillet and then turned on the burner. This
cold-start method allows fat to gently render with
little risk of overcooking the meat just below the sur-
face. By the time the pan gets blazing hot, the skin is
well-rendered, thin, flat, and ready to crisp and brown.
I also spritzed the skin with vegetable oil spray to
keep it from sticking and pierced it with a skewer to
encourage the fat to escape. Once the skin was well
browned, I flipped the breasts and transferred the
skillet to a 325-degree oven. After 30 minutes, the
breasts were perfectly cooked, the skin was crisp, and
the drippings were plentiful.
I had a couple of requirements for the vegetable.
First, it had to come together in the 10 minutes that
the chicken needed to rest. Second, it had to showcase
the deeply savory juices, fond, and fat. I decided on
easy-prep, quick-cooking green beans—they have
plenty of surface area for the drippings to cling to.
But the drippings alone wouldn’t be enough to
flavor the beans; I also needed aromatics and season-
ings. Sliced garlic and red pepper flakes were a natural
fit. I added both to the pan, cranked up the heat, and
scraped up the fond. When the garlic and pepper
flakes started to sizzle, that was my cue that all the
moisture had evaporated and the ingredients were
PHOTOGRAPHY: CARL TREMBLAY
blooming and releasing flavor into the chicken fat.
I added the beans along with ⅓ cup of water and
covered the pan so they could steam. After 8 minutes
or so, I removed the lid and continued simmering just
long enough to reduce the liquid to coat the beans,
which were now infused with the essence of chicken.
I transferred the beans to a platter and showered
them with Parmesan cheese before placing the juicy,
crispy-skinned chicken on top. Dinner was served.
j BY ANDREW JANJIGIAN k
Toasted garlic slices, spicy red pepper flakes, and nutty,
salty Parmesan shreds enhance the rich green beans.
SKILLET-ROASTED CHICKEN BREASTS
WITH GARLICKY GREEN BEANS
SERVES 4 TOTAL TIME: 1¼ HOURS
Trim excess fatty skin from the thick ends of the
breasts. Our recipe for Skillet-Roasted Chicken
Breasts with Garlic-Ginger Broccoli is available for
free for four months at CooksIllustrated.com/feb19.
4 (10- to 12-ounce) bone-in split chicken
breasts, trimmed
2¼ teaspoons kosher salt, divided
Vegetable oil spray
3 garlic cloves, sliced thin
¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes
1¼ pounds green beans, trimmed
⅓ cup water
1½ ounces Parmesan cheese, shredded (½ cup)
1. Adjust oven rack to lower-middle position and
heat oven to 325 degrees. Working with 1 breast at a
time, use your fingers to carefully separate skin from
meat. Peel back skin, leaving skin attached at top and
bottom of breast and at ribs. Sprinkle 1½ teaspoons
salt evenly over chicken (⅜ teaspoon per breast). Lay
skin back in place. Using metal skewer or tip of paring
knife, poke 6 to 8 holes in fat deposits in skin of each
breast. Spray skin with oil spray.
JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019
13
2. Place chicken, skin side down, in 12-inch oven-
safe skillet and set over medium-high heat. Cook,
moving chicken as infrequently as possible, until skin
is well browned, 7 to 9 minutes.
3. Carefully flip chicken and transfer skillet to
oven. Roast until chicken registers 160 degrees,
25 to 30 minutes.
4. Transfer chicken to plate; do not discard liquid
in skillet. Add garlic, pepper flakes, and remaining
¾ teaspoon salt to skillet and cook over medium-high
heat, stirring occasionally and scraping up any
browned bits, until moisture has evaporated and
mixture begins to sizzle, 2 to 4 minutes. Add green
beans and water and bring to simmer. Cover skillet,
reduce heat to medium, and cook until green beans
are tender, 8 to 10 minutes, stirring halfway through
cooking. Uncover and continue to cook, stirring
frequently, until sauce begins to coat green beans,
2 to 4 minutes longer. Add any accumulated chicken
juices to skillet and toss to combine. Season with salt
to taste. Transfer green beans to serving platter and
sprinkle with Parmesan. Top with chicken and serve.
SKILLET-ROASTED CHICKEN BREASTS
WITH HARISSA-MINT CARROTS
Substitute 1 thinly sliced shallot for garlic and 2
teaspoons harissa for pepper flakes. Substitute 1½
pounds carrots, peeled and sliced on bias ¼ inch
thick, for green beans. Increase salt for vegetables to
1 teaspoon, water to ½ cup, and covered cooking
time to 10 to 12 minutes. Add 2 teaspoons lemon
juice and 1½ teaspoons chopped fresh mint with
accumulated chicken juices. Substitute additional 1½
teaspoons chopped fresh mint for Parmesan.
Flavoring the Vegetables
After our chicken breasts are inished roasting,
the skillet is full of goodness: fond (browned
proteins), rendered fat, and savory juices.
Instead of taking the usual approach—
pouring of some of the fat and
making a pan sauce with what
remains—we use it all as the
base for a rich, complemen-
tary vegetable side dish.
S T E P - BY- S T E P V I D E O A N D
N U T R I T I O N I N F O R M AT I O N
CooksIllustrated.com/FEB19
 New-School Sautéed Mushrooms
Want savory, meaty-textured, deeply browned mushrooms without
a lot of work, time, or even oil? Start by adding water.
j BY LAN LAM k

Y
ou don’t have to be a profes- Full Steam Ahead
sional chef to know that “sauté” Thanks to our recent recipe for
means to sear food in a small Caramelized Onions (September/
amount of hot fat so that it October 2017), I had a good idea of what
browns deeply and develops savory flavor. to do: Start by adding water—not oil—
So you might wonder how I—a profes- to the skillet with the mushrooms. This
sional chef—came to conclude that the might sound counterintuitive since the
most important step when sautéing mush- whole idea of browning is to eliminate
rooms is to first simmer them in water. moisture so that food can rise above
To explain, let me start by recounting 212 degrees and the browning reactions
what typically happens when you sauté can take place. But as with onions,
mushrooms. You heat a little oil in a skillet, surrounding the mushrooms with steam
throw in the sliced fungi, and toss them from the get-go would mean that all of
around. Pretty soon, there’s no oil left in the the mushrooms would start cooking right
skillet, so you add a little more to lubricate away. Their cells would rupture sooner so
the pan and encourage the browning that that the mushrooms could rapidly exude
creates loads of new, rich-tasting flavor moisture—the step that’s the requisite
compounds. But mushrooms suck up oil precursor to browning.
like crazy, and you find yourself adding more So I loaded up my 12-inch nonstick skil-
and more. Then, just as browning seems to let with a little more than a pound of sliced
be getting underway, the mushrooms start white button mushrooms (enough to yield
to release their abundant moisture. Only about 4 servings) and ¼ cup of water. I
once all of their jus has evaporated—which cranked the heat to high and, sure enough,
takes a lot of time and frequent stirring so within moments the liquid in the pan turned
the process happens evenly among all the gray—proof that the mushrooms were
slices—can browning start in earnest. But by giving up their jus. After only 5 minutes
that time, you’ve already added so much fat Serve these deeply flavored mushrooms as a side dish or use them as an and just occasional stirring, that liquid had
to the pan that you may as well have deep- omelet filling or as a topping for polenta, steak, or crostini. evaporated and the mound of mushrooms
fried the mushrooms. I’d started with had reduced enough to fit
The problem is that mushrooms are full of meaty-tasting, well-browned mushrooms—not in a single layer across the skillet’s cooking surface.
air pockets that readily absorb oil. And all that spongy oil receptacles—I’d have to start by quickly From there, I proceeded with a typical sauté
water they contain thwarts browning. To yield ridding them of all that air and water. method, drizzling several tablespoons of oil over
the mushrooms to speed browning and letting them
sizzle over medium-high heat until they developed
Expand Your Mushroom Universe good color.
Most people’s go-to mushrooms are white, cremini, portobello, and maybe shiitake. These are all excellent
mushrooms with deep earthy lavor, but our sautéed mushroom recipes are a good opportunity to try two Oil Spill
other varieties that are increasingly available in supermarkets: oyster and maitake. Oyster mushrooms (second But, surprisingly, multiple tablespoons of fat now
from right), recognizable by their fan-shaped caps, boast a clean savory lavor; they are often sold with their seemed like way too much. Instead of readily
stems connected at the base. Maitake mushrooms (far right), which are also known as hen-of-the-woods, have soaking up the oil and leaving just enough to
frilly caps; their stems may also be connected at the base. They lubricate the pan and encourage browning, as they
feature a nutty, slightly smoky lavor. All these mushrooms can do when sautéed the typical way, the mushrooms
be used on their own or in combination in our recipes. didn’t absorb much oil at all. In fact, much of the
oil remained in the pan, so the mushrooms cooked
PHOTOGRAPHY: STEVE KLISE

up grease-slicked.
I ran a series of tests in which I incrementally
decreased the amount of oil I added to the pan
after the water evaporated, and I was stunned to
discover that a mere ½ teaspoon was all I needed
to prevent sticking and help accelerate browning.
Why? Because while raw mushrooms contain air

COOK’S ILLUSTRATED

14
 Is It Bad to Wash
Mushrooms?
Years ago, we weighed white mushrooms before
and after submerging them in water and found
that the fungi soaked up very little water during
their wash. That’s because mushrooms are built
to repel water—if they didn’t, they’d turn to mush
in the irst rain. They use several methods to keep
dry, including secreting specialized proteins called
hydrophobins. To ind out if other types of mush-
rooms are just as water-resistant, we expanded
our original test, irst weighing batches of white,
cremini, portobello, shiitake, oyster, and maitake
mushrooms and then submerging each batch in
water for 1 minute. We removed the mushrooms
and blotted them dry before weighing them again.
It turns out that mushroom gills hold a lot of
water in their folds. Portobello and shiitake mush-
rooms, which have lots of exposed gills, held on
to two to three times as much water as white and
cremini mushrooms. Oyster mushrooms, with
the most gills per square inch, held a whopping
25 percent of their weight in water.
( The takeaway: For our sautéed mushroom
recipe, which starts with adding water, it’s ine to
wash any mushrooms, though gill-heavy mush-
rooms may take signiicantly longer to cook. For
more-traditional techniques such as roasting,
avoid washing mushrooms with lots of exposed
gills (oyster, portobello, maitake, and shiitake).
Instead, simply brush of any dirt with a pastry
brush or a wet paper towel. –L.L.
1 TABLESPOON ¼ CUP
Amount of water Amount of water
absorbed by 1 pound of absorbed by 1 pound of
white mushrooms oyster mushrooms
pockets that readily soak up oil, cooking the mush-
rooms before adding oil collapses those air pockets
ILLUSTRATION: JOHN BURGOYNE (LEFT), JAY LAYMAN (TOP RIGHT)
so that they can’t absorb nearly as much. (See
“Can You Prevent Mushrooms from Absorbing Too
Much Oil?” on page 31.)
Butter Them Up
Now that I had a method for sautéing mushrooms
that was not only efficient but also downright
lean, I felt justified in lavishing the mushrooms
with a glossy butter-based glaze.
Once they were well browned, I lowered the heat
to medium and pushed the mushrooms to the sides
of the pan to clear a space. In went a tablespoon of
butter and some minced shallot and rosemary to lend
the dish depth and fragrance, followed by red wine
and cider vinegar to deglaze the pan.
I gave the contents a stir to evenly coat the
mushrooms with the sauce, but on closer inspection
I noticed that the mushrooms were coated with
Reinventing Sautéed Mushrooms: Add Lots
of Liquid (Twice)
ADD WATER FIRST; ADD OIL LATER
Steam cooks the mushrooms quickly so they collapse and
release liquid. After the mushroom jus evaporates, we add
just 1/2 teaspoon of oil to brown the mushrooms.
droplets of fat—a clear sign that simply tossing the
butter-wine mixture with the mushrooms hadn’t
thoroughly emulsified the sauce.
The problem was that there was very little sauce
compared to the volume of mushrooms in the pan,
which made it difficult to vigorously stir the mix-
ture and incorporate the butter. So going forward
I added ½ cup of chicken broth after the deglazing
liquid had evaporated, and I let the buttery broth
simmer until it had reduced by about half and the
fat had emulsified into the liquid.
These were the dinner party–worthy sautéed
mushrooms I’d had in mind: well browned, meaty
textured, flavor packed, and lightly glossed with
a buttery glaze. I checked that the recipe worked
with portobello, cremini, and shiitake mushrooms
and, to make it even more special, tried subbing in
oyster and maitake mushrooms, varieties that are
increasingly available in supermarkets. I also pulled
together a few more simple sauces to give the dish
some real bandwidth.
SAUTÉED MUSHROOMS WITH
RED WINE AND ROSEMARY
SERVES 4 TOTAL TIME: 35 MINUTES
Use one variety of mushroom or a combination. Stem
and halve portobello mushrooms and cut each half
crosswise into ½-inch pieces. Trim white or cremini
mushrooms; quarter them if large or medium or halve
them if small. Tear trimmed oyster mushrooms into
1- to 1½-inch pieces. Stem shiitake mushrooms;
quarter large caps and halve small caps. Cut trimmed
maitake (hen-of-the-woods) mushrooms into 1- to
1½-inch pieces. (See page 28 for more preparation
information.) You can substitute vegetable broth for
the chicken broth, if desired.
1¼ pounds mushrooms
¼ cup water
½ teaspoon vegetable oil
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 shallot, minced
1 teaspoon minced fresh rosemary
¼ teaspoon table salt
JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019
15
ADD BROTH; REDUCE TO A GLAZE
We sauté aromatics in 1 tablespoon of butter, deglaze
the pan, and then simmer the mushrooms in 1/2 cup of
broth until it reduces to a silky, emulsified glaze.
¼ teaspoon pepper
¼ cup red wine
1 tablespoon cider vinegar
½ cup chicken broth
1. Cook mushrooms and water in 12-inch nonstick
skillet over high heat, stirring occasionally, until skillet
is almost dry and mushrooms begin to sizzle, 4 to
8 minutes. Reduce heat to medium-high. Add oil and
toss until mushrooms are evenly coated. Continue
to cook, stirring occasionally, until mushrooms are
well browned, 4 to 8 minutes longer. Reduce heat
to medium.
2. Push mushrooms to sides of skillet. Add but-
ter to center. When butter has melted, add shallot,
rosemary, salt, and pepper to center and cook, stir-
ring constantly, until aromatic, about 30 seconds.
Add wine and vinegar and stir mixture into mush-
rooms. Cook, stirring occasionally, until liquid has
evaporated, 2 to 3 minutes. Add broth and cook,
stirring occasionally, until glaze is reduced by half,
about 3 minutes. Season with salt and pepper to
taste, and serve.
SAUTÉED MUSHROOMS WITH
MUSTARD AND PARSLEY
Omit rosemary. Substitute 1 tablespoon Dijon
mustard for wine and increase vinegar to 1½ table-
spoons (liquid will take only 1 to 2 minutes to
evaporate). Stir in 2 tablespoons chopped fresh
parsley before serving.
SAUTÉED MUSHROOMS WITH
SOY, SCALLION, AND GINGER
Substitute 1 thinly sliced scallion for shallot and
grated fresh ginger for rosemary. Omit salt.
Substitute 2 tablespoons soy sauce for wine and
sherry vinegar for cider vinegar.
S T E P - BY- S T E P V I D E O A N D
N U T R I T I O N I N F O R M AT I O N
CooksIllustrated.com/FEB19
Getting the Most out of Your Most
Important Knife
A good chef’s knife is indispensable for all cutting tasks, from precision work such
as mincing a shallot to heavy-duty jobs such as breaking down a butternut squash.
Here’s how to make sure you use it to its best advantage. BY ELIZABETH BOMZE AND KEITH DRESSER
STA RT W I T H A G O OD K N I F E
We believe that all kitchen tasks go better and more easily when you use well-designed equipment, and this maxim is espe-
cially true of a chef ’s knife. It’s imperative to have a good one. Our two favorites merge the knife traditions of the East and
West: curved cutting edges that encourage the rocking motion favored by most Western cooks and slimmer blades
like those common on Japanese knives, which can more deftly move through food.

Why Eight Is the Magic Number

Victorinox Swiss Army Fibrox Pro
8" Chef’s Knife ($37.62)
Our Swiss-made longtime favorite continually beats out
the competition with its 15-degree cutting edge (versus
the 20-degree angle of classic Western chef ’s knives) that
slides efortlessly through food yet is sturdy enough to
easily cut through hard butternut squash. We also love its
good edge retention and textured, secure grip—not to
mention its bargain price.
Masamoto VG-10 Gyutou, 8.2" ($136.50)
For those willing to fork over more for a chef ’s knife,
this knife’s asymmetrical cutting edge (21 degrees on one
side, 9 degrees on the other) cuts through anything it
encounters like a dream, including butternut squash and
chicken cartilage. With a blade more curved than those of
many Japanese knives, it also assists a rocking motion that
cleanly minces herbs. Its edge retention is excellent.
Chef ’s knives range in length from
8 to 10 inches. We ind that 8 inches
is long enough to maneuver through a
wide roast or a hefty watermelon but
short enough to allow good control of
the blade.

HOW TO H O L D T H E K N I FE
The irst step to making eicient cuts is holding the knife appropriately. The “Claw”: Not a knife grip but the posi-
tion of your hand holding the food. Curve
Pinch Grip: Pinch the blade where it meets the handle with your thumb your ingers into a claw on top of the food,
and foreinger. This grip, our go-to for most cutting tasks, allows you to making sure to tuck your thumb behind
choke up on the blade to get leverage over the whole length of the knife. them and pressing down to hold the food
in place. This position allows your knuckles
Finger Grip: Rest your thumb on the side of the blade and your fore- to help guide the side of the blade while
inger on the spine. This grip is useful for precision tasks in which you’re your ingertips stay out of harm’s way.
mainly using the tip of the blade and don’t need to put a lot of force With practice, your claw will move back
behind it, such as illeting ish. in even incre-
ments after
Handle Grip: Grasp the knife irmly where the handle meets the blade. each cut,
While this grip can often feel the most secure for inexperienced cooks, guiding the
it doesn’t ofer the control over the tip that is needed to make precision knife to make
cuts. We recommend using this grip only when honing the blade or when even slices.
mincing herbs.

COOK’S ILLUSTRATED

16
 THR E E C U T S EV E RY C O OK SHO U L D KNOW
The goal when cutting any food is to avoid crushing or bruising it and to create even-size pieces that cook at the same rate and/or ensure even lavor distribution
throughout the dish. With practice, executing the proper motions—all of which rely on a pushing or pulling action rather than a straight downward cut—will make your
prep work go much more smoothly and quickly.

1 SLICING: Create lat, stable surface by cutting food in half or removing

thin slice from bottom. Hold food with claw grip.

For small items, keep tip down: Using pinch grip and with tip of knife on cutting
board and middle of blade resting on food, push down and forward, using length
of blade to cut through food. As you cut, blade follows rocking motion: As heel
of knife goes down, knife slices forward; then, blade slides back as heel is lifted up.
For large items, lift blade up: To slice large items such as eggplant, use pinch grip
and lift entire blade of board to start each cut. Starting with front part of blade
on food, push down and forward. As you cut, blade follows same rocking motion 2 MINCING: Start by roughly
chopping food using pinch
as with small item. grip and slicing cut. Then gather food
What it’s used for: Most vegetable and fruit prep into small pile. While steadying tip of
knife with your nondominant hand 3 TIP CUT: This precision cut
uses only the knife tip. Using
Take the Sharpness Test and using handle grip, rock knife pinch grip, place tip of knife on food
Hold a sheet of paper by one end and up and down with slight pivoting and draw it through or across food
drag your knife, from heel to tip, across it. motion, without lifting knife tip of with gentle downward pressure.
If the knife snags or fails to cut the paper, board, until food is evenly minced. What it’s used for: Cutting meat
it needs to be honed or sharpened. What it’s used for: Herbs, garlic from around bones or crosshatching
cloves, zest fat on meat

K E E P IN G YO U R C H E F ’ S K NI F E SHA RP
A sharp knife is a precise, eicient tool, while a dull knife is an accident waiting to
happen. That’s because a dull blade requires more force to do the job and has
a higher chance of slipping and missing the mark. The result most often is food
that’s crushed or bruised. And it doesn’t take months or weeks for a knife to
lose its edge. Even a few minutes of cutting dense or hard foods can dull a blade.
To maintain your knife, you should hone it or sharpen it regularly.
Honing versus Sharpening
Honing a knife with a honing steel (also referred to as a sharpening steel—a mis-
nomer) repositions (or “trues”) the edge of a blade that is slightly out of alignment
to restore sharpness. Sharpening trims and reshapes the blade by removing metal
that is blunted or too far out of alignment for honing to work.

How Often Should You Hone? How Often Should You Sharpen?
A good rule of thumb is to use a honing steel every time you start to cook. If you cook often, you should check your knife weekly for
If you are doing a lot of heavy cutting work, such as butchering a chicken sharpness using the sharpness test. If it fails the test, try
or slicing a lot of onions, it’s a good idea honing irst. If that doesn’t work, run it through a sharpener.
to also hone while you are working.
Regular maintenance will prolong the time Two Great Sharpeners
between sharpening sessions. Manual: Chef ’sChoice Pronto
Manual Diamond Hone Asian
1. Using handle grip, place tip of Knife Sharpener ($49.99)
honing steel on counter and heel of Comments: Tall walls hold the knife steady
blade against its top, pointing knife so that a 15-degree blade can be drawn through
tip slightly upward. Hold blade at the chamber with even pressure. The slim body is easily
ILLUSTRATION: JOHN BURGOYNE

consistent angle away from steel (15 to stowed in a drawer.

20 degrees depending on the knife).
2. Maintaining light pressure and consistent Electric: Chef ’sChoice Trizor
angle, sweep blade down length of steel, pulling XV Knife Sharpener ($149.99)
knife toward your body so that entire edge of blade Comments: The aggressive
makes contact with steel. irst slot can quickly repair
3. Repeat this motion on other side of blade. Four or 5 extensive damage and narrow a 20-degree Western
strokes on each side of blade (total of 8 to 10 alternating knife to a sharper 15-degree edge. Use the ine slot to
passes) should realign edge. gently resharpen a slightly dull knife.

JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019

17
 Beet Salad in Less Than an Hour
Want sweet, velvety beets without the wait? Micro-steam them.
I
f you aren’t cooking beets, you should be.
They’re cheap, widely available, and nutri-
tious. When properly cooked, they feature
velvety texture, earthy sweetness, and vibrant
color that make them the focus of salads and sides.
If only they cooked faster. While roasting—the
most common method—is easy (just wrap whole
unpeeled beets in foil and throw them in the oven),
even average-size beets need more than an hour to
turn truly tender. Plus, you have to wait for the oven
to preheat and then for the roasted specimens to cool
before peeling. Also, beets cooked this way can’t be
seasoned; the salt merely sits on the skins.
I brainstormed ways to speed things up. Since
water transfers heat more efficiently than air does, I
tried boiling whole beets. This saved only 15 minutes.
Peeling the beets with a vegetable peeler and cutting
them into chunks shortened the cooking time to
25 minutes, but the beets leached flavor and inky
color into the water and tasted washed-out. Steaming
produced more flavorful results but took 50 minutes.
We often jump-start food in the microwave, so I
gave that a whirl. I microwaved the beets for 20 min-
utes and then spread them on a baking sheet to finish
in the oven, which took another 20 minutes. Not bad,
but the cut surfaces browned, turning more savory
than sweet—I wanted maximum sweetness.
Why not use the microwave to go all the way?
Although it’s a myth that microwaves penetrate all
the way to the center of even the thickest food, they
can easily penetrate to the interior of a beet chunk and
heat the water molecules inside it, effectively steaming
it from within. Indeed, the microwaved beets were
tender in 25 minutes, the same as for boiling but
without the washed-out flavor. Their surfaces were
a tad dry, so I nuked another batch with ⅓ cup of
water added to the bowl and covered it with a plate
to trap steam.
These beets were silky and tender, and I could
season them by adding a little salt to the water. And
since I’d already peeled them, I could simply drain
them and add them directly to a showstopper salad.
My hang-up with most beet salads—the kind
tossed with goat cheese, nuts, and greens—is that the
creamy cheese smears all over the other ingredients
and turns muddy while the beets sink to the bot-
tom of the bowl. So instead, I used the goat cheese
as an anchor for the salad, thinning it with lemon
S T E P - BY- S T E P V I D E O A N D
N U T R I T I O N I N F O R M AT I O N
CooksIllustrated.com/FEB19
j BY STEVE DUNN k
For a pretty presentation, we spread a creamy dressing
on the platter before arranging the salad on top.
juice and water; seasoning it with lemon zest, herbs,
and spices; and spreading it across a serving platter.
Then I topped it with a few handfuls of arugula and
the beets (both lightly dressed with olive oil and
more lemon juice), followed by toasted almonds
for nutty crunch.
The “schmear” tactic worked well with blue
cheese and yogurt, too, so I put together a couple
more company-worthy salads. But given the speed
and convenience of my new cooking method, I’ll be
micro-steaming beets for just about any salad or side.
Why Beets Take So Long to Cook
Most vegetables turn to mush after being micro-
waved for half an hour because the pectin and
hemicellulose that hold their cells together dissolve
in the heat. But beets contain phenolic compounds
that toughen their cellular cement. As a result, beet
pectin is particularly heat-stable, which means it
takes longer to soften beets during cooking.
MUSHY TURNIP FIRM BEET
COOK’S ILLUSTRATED
18
BEET SALAD WITH GOAT CHEESE
AND ARUGULA
SERVES 6 TOTAL TIME: 50 MINUTES
Be sure to wear gloves when peeling and dicing
the beets to prevent your hands from becoming
stained. The moisture content of goat cheese var-
ies, so add the water slowly in step 2. For the best
presentation, use red beets here, not golden or
Chioggia beets. Our recipes for Beet Salad with
Blue Cheese and Endive and Beet Salad with Spiced
Yogurt and Watercress are available for free for four
months at CooksIllustrated.com/feb19.
2 pounds beets, trimmed, peeled, and cut into
¾-inch pieces
½ teaspoon plus ⅛ teaspoon plus 2 pinches
table salt, divided
4 ounces goat cheese, crumbled (1 cup)
2 tablespoons minced fresh chives, divided
½ teaspoon grated lemon zest plus 5 teaspoons
juice, divided, plus extra juice for seasoning
½ teaspoon caraway seeds
¼ teaspoon pepper
5 ounces (5 cups) baby arugula
¼ cup sliced almonds, toasted, divided
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil, divided
1. In largest bowl your microwave will accom-
modate, stir together beets, ⅓ cup water, and
½ teaspoon salt. Cover with plate and microwave
until beets can be easily pierced with paring knife,
25 to 30 minutes, stirring halfway through micro-
waving. Drain beets in colander and let cool.
2. In medium bowl, use rubber spatula to mash
together goat cheese, 1 tablespoon chives, lemon
zest and 2 teaspoons juice, caraway seeds, pepper,
and ⅛ teaspoon salt. Slowly stir in up to ⅓ cup
water until mixture has consistency of regular
yogurt. Season with salt, pepper, and extra lemon
juice to taste. Spread goat cheese mixture over
serving platter.
3. In large bowl, combine arugula, 2 table-
spoons almonds, 2 teaspoons oil, 1 teaspoon lemon PHOTOGRAPHY: CARL TREMBLAY
juice, and pinch salt and toss to coat. Arrange
arugula mixture on top of goat cheese mixture,
leaving 1-inch border of goat cheese mixture. Add
beets to now-empty bowl and toss with remaining
2 teaspoons lemon juice, remaining 1 teaspoon
oil, and remaining pinch salt. Place beet mixture
on top of arugula mixture. Sprinkle salad with
remaining 2 tablespoons almonds and remaining
1 tablespoon chives and serve.
 Spiced Roasted Chickpeas
To turn a can of chickpeas into a crunchy, salty snack, start with a burst of heat.
R
oasted, salted chickpeas have long been
popular in the Middle East. In 1875
they were so well-liked that Armenian
composer Dikran Tchouhadjian named
his operetta after a peddler of the snack: Leblebici
Horhor Aga (Master Hor-Hor, the Chickpea
Vendor). Roasted chickpeas have become trendy
in the United States, too. It’s easy to see why: They
boast the crunch and saltiness of chips and pretzels,
but they’re protein-packed and lighter on oil.
Recipes are straightforward: Just drain canned
chickpeas and oven-roast (temperatures and times
vary widely) until crisp. Some add oil from the get-go,
others wait. Ditto for spices, salt, and sugar.
I found that the oil (1½ tablespoons per can of
beans) needed to go on early to help crisp the chick-
peas, lest they simply dry out. Spices, on the other
hand, burned and turned bitter when added at the
start. Fortunately, residual heat in the chickpeas was
sufficient to bloom the spices.
Choosing an oven temperature was more challeng-
ing. At high temperatures, the chickpeas split slightly
at their seams, creating tiny pathways for oil to enter.
As the beans “fried,” they expanded like popcorn,
turning from creamy and dense to light and crisp.
But by the time they were crisp, many had burned. A
low-and-slow approach had the opposite effect: The
chickpeas simply shrank and turned hard, becoming
more like unpopped popcorn kernels.
If the beans needed a burst of heat to turn crisp
and airy but were prone to burning, the solution was
obvious: Start high and finish low. Indeed, 30 minutes
at 500 degrees followed by 30 minutes at 400 degrees
produced a light, crunchy snack. But the results varied
depending on the oven I used. Highly insulated ovens
held on to lots of heat even after the temperature was
reduced, scorching the beans, whereas poorly insu-
lated ovens required longer cooking times.
Could I transfer the high-heat stage to the micro-
wave? Yes. After a 10-minute zap, most of the beans
had split. Tossed with oil and roasted for an hour
at 350 degrees, they were as good as any I’d made
using just the oven. The beans at the edges of the pan
still sometimes burned, so I pushed them all toward
PHOTOGRAPHY: CARL TREMBLAY
the center after a midpoint stir (see “Corral Your
Chickpeas”). Now every last chickpea was perfect.
Finally, the spices. Chickpeas are used throughout
India, so a version with curry spices seemed appro-
priate. Another, seasoned with smoked paprika and
cayenne, was reminiscent of the Spanish bar snacks I
love. I also came up with a chickpea version of barbe-
cue potato chips, just to show that the sky’s the limit
with this delicious—and virtuous—recipe.
j BY ANDREW JANJIGIAN k
Roasted chickpeas are great to nibble with cocktails,
sprinkle on salads, or pack in a lunchbox.
INDIAN-SPICED ROASTED CHICKPEAS
SERVES 6 (MAKES ABOUT 1⅔ CUPS)
TOTAL TIME: 1¼ HOURS, PLUS 30 MINUTES COOLING
This recipe calls for a metal baking pan; using glass
or ceramic will result in unevenly cooked chickpeas.
The chickpeas make a great snack when dusted with
spices, but you can also season them simply with salt
and a pinch of cayenne pepper and use them as a
salad garnish. Our recipe for Spanish-Spiced Roasted
Chickpeas is available for free for four months at
CooksIllustrated.com/feb19.
2 (15-ounce) cans chickpeas
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 teaspoons paprika
1 teaspoon ground coriander
½ teaspoon ground turmeric
½ teaspoon ground allspice
½ teaspoon ground cumin
½ teaspoon sugar
⅜ teaspoon kosher salt
⅛ teaspoon cayenne pepper
1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat
oven to 350 degrees. Place chickpeas in colander and
let drain for 10 minutes. Line large plate with double
layer of paper towels. Spread chickpeas over plate in
JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019
19
even layer. Microwave until exteriors of chickpeas
are dry and many have split slightly at seams, 8 to
12 minutes.
2. Transfer chickpeas to 13 by 9-inch metal bak-
ing pan. Add oil and stir until evenly coated. Using
spatula, spread chickpeas into single layer. Transfer
to oven and roast for 30 minutes. While chickpeas
are roasting, combine paprika, coriander, turmeric,
allspice, cumin, sugar, salt, and cayenne in small bowl.
3. Stir chickpeas and crowd toward center of pan,
avoiding edges of pan as much as possible. Continue
to roast until chickpeas appear dry, slightly shriveled,
and deep golden brown, 20 to 40 minutes longer.
(To test for doneness, remove a few paler chickpeas
and let cool briefly before tasting; if interiors are soft,
return to oven for 5 minutes before testing again.)
4. Transfer chickpeas to large bowl. Toss with
spice mixture to coat. Season with salt to taste. Let
cool completely before serving, about 30 minutes.
(Chickpeas can be stored in airtight container for up
to 1 week.)
BARBECUE-SPICED ROASTED CHICKPEAS
Omit allspice and cumin. Substitute 1 tablespoon
smoked paprika for paprika, garlic powder for corian-
der, and onion powder for turmeric. Increase sugar
to 1½ teaspoons.
CORRAL YOUR CHICKPEAS
We found that the chickpeas at the edges of a
rimmed baking sheet tended to scorch toward the
end of the roasting time. We could prevent this
with frequent stirring, but that let heat escape from
the oven, so the chickpeas took longer to inish.
Instead, we switched to a 13 by 9-inch metal
baking pan: Its high sides delect some
of the oven’s heat. We also
crowd the chickpeas
toward the center
of the pan and away
from the hotter sides.
SCORCH-PROOF
Mounding the chickpeas
in the middle of the pan
shields them from burning.
S T E P - BY- S T E P V I D E O A N D
N U T R I T I O N I N F O R M AT I O N
CooksIllustrated.com/FEB19
 Easiest-Ever Biscuits
We combine two classic methods (and break a cardinal rule)
to make tender, luffy biscuits that come together in record time.
j BY ANDREA GEARY k

A
fresh, warm biscuit instantly Getting Creamed
doubles the coziness quo- I wondered if things could be as simple
tient of practically anything as adding more cream to a cream biscuit
you serve it with: chicken dough until it was loose enough to drop.
stew, vegetable soup, fried eggs, or—my I whisked together 3 cups of all-purpose
favorite accompaniment—another fresh, flour, a tablespoon of baking powder, and
warm biscuit. But mastering the tradi- a teaspoon of salt and then experimented
tional biscuit-making technique takes with adding enough cream to make a
some practice. scoopable dough, which turned out to be
First, you combine flour with salt, bak- 3 cups—¾ cup more than the usual amount
ing powder, and maybe a bit of sugar (a called for. I then deposited scoops of the
highly contentious addition—more about dough on a parchment-lined baking sheet
that later) and then toss in cubes of cold and baked them in a 400-degree oven.
butter, which you crumble and flatten Sounds so easy that it makes you won-
until precisely the right amount of tiny der why cookbooks aren’t bursting with
butter flakes are strewn evenly throughout dropped-cream-biscuit recipes, right? Here’s
the flour. Next, you stir in cold milk or why: It didn’t work. The dough mounds
buttermilk—masters of the art emphasize spread as they baked and came out looking
that everything must remain frigid—until like bland, lumpy cookies. They had a pleas-
the mixture forms a shaggy dough. Finally, antly milky flavor, a tender crumb, and a
you transfer the mass of dough to the crisp exterior, but they left thick, greasy spots
counter, gently roll or pat it out, and cut on the parchment and a slick on my fingers.
out rounds with a sharp biscuit cutter Clearly, the additional moisture and
before transferring them to the oven and fat from the extra cream were the source
baking them for about 15 minutes. of these problems. But I couldn’t reduce
It’s not difficult, but there are rules that the amount of cream—that would bring
must be followed, and all that mashing of For a glossy, rich finish, we like to brush the biscuits with melted butter me right back where I’d started, with a
the butter and rolling and cutting can get when they are fresh from the oven. dough that was too dry to drop. Maybe
messy. Happily, there are shortcuts. I was asking for the impossible: a dough
Want to skip cutting in the butter? Make cream heavy cream. Thanks to the cream’s generous but- that was moist and scoopable before baking but that
biscuits: Replace both the butter and the milk with terfat content, the biscuits will be plenty rich and acted like a drier, less fatty dough in the oven, rising
tender. This formula makes a pretty stiff dough, so instead of spreading out. And I was expecting that a
you’ll still have to roll and cut. single ingredient, cream, would perform this miracle.

PHOTOGRAPHY: CARL TREMBLAY; ILLUSTRATION: JOHN BURGOYNE

TECHNIQUE
KEEP THE SCOOP SLICK
To ensure that the dough releases easily from
the measuring cup, we spray it with vegetable oil consistency. Simply drop scoops of the soft dough and sugar mixed in) and solid fat. The fat particles in
spray after every three or four scoops.
Want to skip rolling and cutting? Make drop
biscuits: Start by cutting the butter into the dry Less Really Is More
ingredients in the traditional way, but add extra That was when I had a revelation. Cream isn’t a
buttermilk or milk so that the dough has a wetter single ingredient, it’s two: water (with a little protein
onto the baking sheet and bake. cream are so minute that we don’t perceive them as
Cream biscuits tend to be more uniform and solid, and they were stowing away in the cream only
have a subtly layered structure, while drop bis- to melt in the heat of the oven, making the biscuits
cuits are more craggy, with a beautifully tender, greasy and, in combination with the water in the
cake-like crumb. Why couldn’t I have the benefits cream, causing them to spread.
of both styles and make a dropped cream biscuit, A new thunderbolt struck: What if I melted the
aka “dream biscuit”? As that nickname suggests, it fat by warming the cream before I mixed it into the
would be the easiest biscuit ever. dough? That sound you just heard was the collective
gasp of generations of horrified Southern bakers,
S T E P - BY- S T E P V I D E O A N D but hear me out: Maybe heating the cream would
N U T R I T I O N I N F O R M AT I O N increase its fluidity enough to enable me to make
CooksIllustrated.com/FEB19 a scoopable dough with less of it. If so, that could
potentially fix both the spreading and the greasiness.

COOK’S ILLUSTRATED

20
 Making Biscuits Just Got Easier
Biscuits are traditionally made in three styles: classic, cream, and drop. By creating a cream biscuit that can be
dropped, we invented a fourth style that’s the easiest biscuit imaginable to make.
CLASSIC: FUSSIEST
Method: Cut cold butter into dry ingredients,
moisten with milk, roll out, and cut
Results: Flat top; distinctly laky, layered interior
DROP: SKIPS ROLLING OUT DOUGH
Method: Cut in butter, add enough milk to form
dough that can be dropped
Results: Craggy top; slightly irregular interior
My first attempt failed pretty spectacularly. I heated
2 cups of cream to 160 degrees, and as I stirred it
into the dry ingredients, its heat and moisture
activated the baking powder, causing the dough
to expand so boisterously that it defied my frantic
attempts to shovel it into the ⅓-cup measuring cup.
By the time the dough mounds went into the oven,
the baking powder was spent, so the biscuits didn’t
rise. But they didn’t spread either, and they weren’t
objectionably fatty.
A bit of research revealed that the fat in cream
liquefies at between 90 and 95 degrees and the acids
in baking powder are activated at about 140 degrees.
Maybe all I had to do was make sure the cream was
above 95 but below 140.
I cautiously heated the cream only to body tem-
perature and then stirred it into the dry ingredients.
The dough came together easily, neither too dry nor
too wet, and with no riotous inflation. I scooped and
I baked. And I prevailed. Mostly.
These biscuits held their shape beautifully; were
fluffy, not flat; and were pleasantly rich without being
greasy. Their flavor, however, was a bit bland. Having
already flouted the most sacred law of biscuit mak-
ing by introducing a warm ingredient, I took a firm
stand on the side of sugar and added a little to the
dry ingredients. I also added a bit of baking soda, not
for lift but for its slightly mineral-y tang.
You can serve biscuits with almost anything, and
with a recipe this quick and easy, why wouldn’t you?
SCIENCE
WHY WE “MELT” THE CREAM
IN OUR BISCUITS
Fridge-cold cream looks like it’s 100 percent liquid,
but it’s actually a combination of water, protein,
and sugar, with tiny particles of solid butterfat
suspended throughout. By warming the cream just
enough to melt the fat particles (but not enough
to activate the baking powder when the cream is
mixed into the dry ingredients), we turn it into a
CREAM: SKIPS CUTTING IN BUTTER pure liquid. This means we can use less cream to
Method: Substitute cream for butter and milk, roll create a dough that is still loose enough to scoop
out, and cut and drop but that doesn’t spread too much or
Results: Flat top; subtly layered interior bake up too greasy. To demonstrate this efect,
we made two doughs using 2 cups of cream. In
one batch, the cream was fridge-cold; in the other,
we warmed it. The dough made with the warmed
cream was noticeably loose and easy to scoop.
CREAM/DROP: NO BUTTER CUTTING
OR ROLLING OUT
Method: Use less cream than in cream biscuit; warm it
to create dough that is loose enough to be dropped
Results: Subtly craggy top; lufy, cake-like interior
EASIEST-EVER BISCUITS
SERVES 10 TOTAL TIME: 40 MINUTES
COLD CREAM
Dough is too dry to drop.
These biscuits come together very quickly, so in the
interest of efficiency, start heating your oven before
gathering your ingredients. We like these biscuits
brushed with a bit of melted butter, but you can
skip that step if you’re serving the biscuits with a rich
accompaniment such as sausage gravy.
3 cups (15 ounces) all-purpose flour
4 teaspoons sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon baking soda
1¼ teaspoons table salt
2 cups heavy cream
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted (optional) WARMED CREAM
Dough is loose and scoopable.
1. Adjust oven rack to upper-middle position
and heat oven to 450 degrees. Line rimmed bak-
ing sheet with parchment paper. In medium bowl, about 2½ inches wide and 1¼ inches tall). Respray
whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, baking measuring cup after every 3 or 4 scoops. If portions
soda, and salt. Microwave cream until just warmed are misshapen, use your fingertips to gently reshape
to body temperature (95 to 100 degrees), 60 to dough into level cylinders. Bake until tops are light
90 seconds, stirring halfway through microwaving. golden brown, 10 to 12 minutes, rotating sheet
Stir cream into flour mixture until soft, uniform halfway through baking. Brush hot biscuits with
dough forms. melted butter, if using. Serve warm. (Biscuits can
2. Spray ⅓-cup dry measuring cup with veg- be stored in zipper-lock bag at room temperature
etable oil spray. Drop level scoops of batter 2 inches for up to 24 hours. Reheat biscuits in 300-degree
apart on prepared sheet (biscuits should measure oven for 10 minutes.)
JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019
21
 How to Make a Better Blondie
Most blondies have a one-note sweetness and too many (and the wrong kind of) mix-ins.
We wanted ours to be chewy, complex, and full of nutty, butterscotchy goodness.
j BY ANNIE PETITO k

D
o blondes have more fun? would help just a little. Working with a
Compared with brownies, standard recipe from my research—a 1:1
which get far more attention ratio of sugar to flour, salt, baking powder, a
than their fairer counterpart, couple of eggs, vanilla extract, and one stick
I’m not so sure. While you have to look of melted butter—I ran a quick side-by-side
hard to find a truly bad brownie, pale, test. Interestingly, most tasters panned the
cloying blondies seem more the rule than dark brown sugar for making the blondies
the exception. Add the fact that they’re taste more like molasses than butterscotch;
often overloaded with bland white choco- they also preferred the more golden color of
late chips or artificially flavored butter- the bars made with light brown sugar.
scotch morsels and it’s a wonder they have But I did have something more promis-
any fun at all. ing in mind to try: Instead of just melting
That’s too bad, because those times I’ve the butter, I would brown it to create warm,
run across a blondie that’s moist, chewy, toasty, nutty flavors. So for my next batch of
slightly dense, and full of complex butter- bars, I cooked the butter in a skillet until the
scotch goodness, I’ve always thought that it milk solids had turned a dark golden brown
could hold its own next to any baked treat, and had a nutty fragrance, combined it with
let alone a brownie. I wanted to perfect this the other ingredients, and then baked the
bar and give it the respect it deserves. batter in a 13 by 9-inch pan in a 350-degree
oven until lightly golden. This was a big step
Mistaken Identities in the right direction: The blondies tasted
Before I got down to serious testing, I decidedly more nutty and rich.
decided to experiment with two popular A colleague had another idea: Since
notions—that blondies are simply brownies vanilla extract’s earthy, woodsy notes mirror
stripped of chocolate, or they’re chocolate and complement butterscotch flavors, why
chip cookies pressed and baked in a pan. not try more of it? Doubling the amount of
(There’s actually an argument for the first Because our blondies are thicker than usual, we can bake them longer, vanilla worked so well to deepen the warm
idea; see “Move Over, Brownie—Blondie which results in a deeply browned top layer full of rich toffee flavor. caramel flavor in the bars that I kept going
Got Here First.”) and tripled it.
I took recipes for chewy brownies and chewy No More Blandies Increasing the vanilla gave me the idea to increase
chocolate chip cookies, eliminated the chocolate in The first decision I faced was the mixing method. another ingredient: the salt. Salt is included in most
the former, and patted the dough for the latter into Blondie recipes typically call either for creaming sweet applications because it helps sharpen all the
a 13 by 9-inch pan. Not surprisingly, when I baked butter and sugar and then adding the eggs and flavors, particularly nutty, buttery ones. When I
them both off, each confection was a dud. dry ingredients or for mixing melted butter with doubled it from ½ teaspoon to 1 teaspoon, those
Without the starch contributed by the cocoa pow- the sugar and eggs before incorporating the dry flavors stood out a little more in my blondies and the
der in the brownie recipe to help absorb moisture and ingredients. Since creaming the butter and sugar sweetness a little less.
fat, the bars were gummy and greasy. They were also incorporates air that results in a cakey texture, I
sickeningly sweet. As for the chocolate chip cookie settled on the second method, which leads to a Domino Effect
bars, which I baked long enough to ensure that the denser, chewier bar. But I still wanted to cut back more on the
dough at the center of the pan wasn’t gooey, they Next order of business: boosting butterscotch fla- sweetness. When I decreased the sugar, the results
were mostly dry and tough, particularly the edge vor. Most blondie recipes call for light brown sugar, were a good reminder that sugar is never merely a
pieces. They also lacked some of the nice toffee notes and I wondered if using dark brown sugar instead sweetener in baking; it plays multiple roles—and PHOTOGRAPHY: CARL TREMBLAY
that cookies gain from browning when they are baked
individually on a cookie sheet. Move Over, Brownie—Blondie Got Here First
Clearly, a blondie has its own identity, and I’d
have to treat it that way to create a successful version. Though the origins of both bars are murky, evidence suggests that the irst brownie was actually (drum roll, please) a
blondie. One of the irst recipes for a confection dubbed a “brownie” appears in the 1896 edition of Fannie Farmer’s
S T E P - BY- S T E P V I D E O A N D The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book in reference to individual cakes lavored with molasses and baked in shallow tins;
N U T R I T I O N I N F O R M AT I O N this was followed in the 1906 edition by a new version of the same recipe calling for chocolate. Over time, the name
CooksIllustrated.com/FEB19 for the molasses brownies morphed into “blonde brownies,” then “butterscotch brownies,” and inally, decades later
(some suggest as late as the 1980s), simply “blondies,” conferring upon this confection an identity all its own.

COOK’S ILLUSTRATED

22
messing with its proportions has consequences.
Because brown sugar adds moisture and, like
all sugar, is hygroscopic (it attracts and retains
moisture), even ¼ cup less made the bars drier.
Sugar also acts as a tenderizer by interfering with
the flour proteins’ ability to form gluten, and less
of it made the bars a little tough.
I needed a sweetener that performed all the
positive actions of sugar but wasn’t too sweet.
The obvious choice was corn syrup. Unlike the
high-fructose corn syrup used to make soda, which
is much sweeter than sugar, regular corn syrup is
actually less sweet: Made by breaking down starch
into glucose molecules and small glucose chains,
corn syrup is about 50 percent less sweet than white
and brown sugars. I subbed in ⅓ cup for ¼ cup of
brown sugar. Even though the corn syrup’s volume
was greater, the cookies tasted noticeably less sweet.
I had the flavor right where I wanted it, but I
wasn’t quite done. Some tasters thought the blon-
dies lacked stature. When I scaled up my recipe by
25 percent to create thicker bars, I found I had to
double the baking time. This had the unintended
but happy consequence of drying out the top of
the batter, so it browned more deeply and had even
more nutty, caramelized flavor while the interior
remained moist and chewy.
RECIPE TESTING
TWO WRONG WAYS TO MAKE
A BLONDIE
In our quest for a great blondie, we put two com-
monly held notions about how to make a blondie
to the test. The results were not favorable.
( Test: Eliminate the chocolate in brownie batter
Results: Without the starch from cocoa powder
to absorb liquid, the bars baked up greasy and
gummy. They were also horribly sweet.
( Test: Bake chocolate chip cookie dough in a
13 by 9-inch baking pan
Results: Without the browning that individually
baked cookies achieve, the bars lacked butter-
scotch lavor; they were also dry and tough.
Secrets to Superior Blondies
For a properly moist, chewy texture, you can’t get around using suicient sugar in a blondie. But our bars
have so many other nutty, buttery, caramel-y lavors that the sweetness stays in check. Here’s how we cre-
ated an ideal version.
BROWNED BUTTER: Melted butter contributes to chewy texture. Browning it darkens the milk solids to
create toasty, nutty depth.
BROWN SUGAR + CORN SYRUP: Brown sugar contributes tofee notes,
and both sweeteners enhance chewy texture. Corn syrup is also less sweet
than other sugars.
LOTS OF VANILLA: Two full tablespoons of vanilla enhance
caramel-like lavors.
PLENTY OF SALT: More than the usual amount of salt in the
batter (plus more on top) brings all the lavors into focus.
COMPLEMENTARY MIX-INS: Pecans add buttery richness;
milk (versus dark) chocolate chips don’t overwhelm the but-
terscotch notes.
It was time to add complementary elements such 1 cup pecans, toasted and chopped coarse
as nuts and chips. Most recipes call for walnuts, ½ cup (3 ounces) milk chocolate chips
but I chose pecans, which have a more buttery ¼–½ teaspoon flake sea salt, crumbled (optional)
flavor. For chips, I passed on white chocolate and
butterscotch morsels as well as dark chocolate 1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat
chips. Instead I opted for milk chocolate morsels, oven to 350 degrees. Make foil sling for 13 by 9-inch
whose mild dairy sweetness didn’t overpower the baking pan by folding 2 long sheets of aluminum foil;
caramel flavor. first sheet should be 13 inches wide and second sheet
As a final touch, I crumbled flaky sea salt over should be 9 inches wide. Lay sheets of foil in pan
the batter before it went into the oven. After the perpendicular to each other, with extra foil hanging
bars cooled completely, I cut them into squares. over edges of pan. Push foil into corners and up sides
These blondies were exactly as I’d envisioned: moist, of pan, smoothing foil flush to pan. Lightly spray foil
chewy, wonderfully complex and butterscotchy, and with vegetable oil spray.
not too sweet. The nuts and chocolate played nicely 2. Whisk flour, table salt, and baking powder
with the browned butter, and the crunchy pops of together in medium bowl.
flaky salt made for an appealing contrast. 3. Heat butter in 10-inch skillet over medium-high
I was equally thrilled to find that the bars kept heat until melted, about 2 minutes. Continue to
very well—for close to a week—at room tempera- cook, swirling skillet and stirring constantly with
ture. Though I doubted they’d last that long. rubber spatula, until butter is dark golden brown
and has nutty aroma, 1 to 3 minutes longer. Remove
BROWNED BUTTER BLONDIES skillet from heat and transfer browned butter to large
MAKES 24 BLONDIES heatproof bowl.
TOTAL TIME: 1¼ HOURS, PLUS 2 HOURS COOLING 4. Add sugar to hot butter and whisk until com-
bined. Add eggs, corn syrup, and vanilla and whisk
We developed this recipe using a metal baking pan; until smooth. Using rubber spatula, stir in flour
using a glass baking dish may cause the blondies mixture until fully incorporated. Stir in pecans and
to overbake. Toast the pecans on a rimmed bak- chocolate chips. Transfer batter to prepared pan;
ing sheet in a 350-degree oven until fragrant, 8 to using spatula, spread batter into corners of pan and
12 minutes, stirring them halfway through. For tips smooth surface. Sprinkle with sea salt, if using. Bake
on how to brown butter, see page 31. until top is deep golden brown and springs backs
when lightly pressed, 35 to 40 minutes, rotating
2¼ cups (11¼ ounces) all-purpose flour pan halfway through baking (blondies will firm as
1¼ teaspoons table salt they cool).
½ teaspoon baking powder 5. Let blondies cool completely in pan on wire
12 tablespoons unsalted butter rack, about 2 hours. Using foil overhang, lift blond-
1¾ cups packed (12¼ ounces) light brown sugar ies out of pan and transfer to cutting board. Remove
3 large eggs foil. Cut into 24 bars. (Blondies can be wrapped
½ cup corn syrup tightly in plastic wrap and stored at room tempera-
2 tablespoons vanilla extract ture for up to 5 days.)
JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019
23
 In Search of the Best Vanilla
Cyclones, theft, petrochemicals, market swings—vanilla is anything but boring.
We delve into this fascinating world and ind the best products for your kitchen.
V
anilla is the world’s most popular fla-
vor and fragrance. It comes in two
forms: pure vanilla extract, which is
derived from the seed pods of vanilla
orchid vines, and synthetic vanilla, which is manu-
factured in a lab. Just 1 percent of the world’s
vanilla flavor is “real”; the rest is imitation.
We call for vanilla widely in our recipes. When we
last evaluated it in 2009, a pure vanilla won our blind
taste tests. Since then, its price has skyrocketed. Pure
vanilla extract from McCormick, one of the most
well-known brands, costs 33 percent more now than
it did back then. Meanwhile, the price of imitation
vanilla has remained steady.
In the last decade, food Goliaths such as Unilever
and Nestlé have moved toward using more “natural”
ingredients, which has led to an increase in demand
for pure extract. In 2017, a cyclone wiped out 30 per-
cent of the vanilla crop on Madagascar, the island that
produces 80 percent of the world’s vanilla beans. Both
factors have contributed to the price hike.
So how does all this affect the vanilla we buy at
the supermarket? To find out, we rounded up 10 of
the top-selling products in the country—seven pure
extracts and three imitation products priced from
$0.12 to $6.19 an ounce. We tasted all the products
uncooked in pudding and frosting and then pitted
the top-rated pure extract against the top-rated imi-
tation product in cake and cookies. But first, we had
to understand the differences between the two styles.
How Vanilla Products Are Made
A labor-intensive crop, vanilla orchids are both
hand-pollinated and hand-picked, mostly on small
farms. After harvesting, the beans are cured. First,
they’re blanched or wilted to kill yeasts and fungi,
which prevent rot. This can be done in the sun, in an
oven, in hot water, or in a freezer. Next, in a process
known as sweating, the beans are wrapped in cloth
and put in hot boxes to help develop flavor. The
beans are then dried over the course of several weeks
and later conditioned, or kept in closed boxes for
several months, to fully mature their flavor. Vanilla
extract is made by soaking the beans in liquid, typi-
cally a mixture of alcohol and water.
Conversely, the faux stuff is flavored primarily
with synthesized vanillin, the main flavor component
of cured vanilla beans. More than 15,000 tons of
pure vanillin are industrially manufactured each year
using a chemical process that starts with a substance
called guaiacol. Guaiacol can be manufactured
j BY HANNAH CROWLEY k
called it “superboosted.” And our
tasters approved: “Lingering; smells
like a vanilla bean pod,” said one.
The real vanillas were more
divisive. U.S. Food and Drug
Administration (FDA) regulations
require “pure vanilla extract” to
contain at least 35 percent alcohol.
Imitation vanilla products contain
less or none at all. Some tasters
liked the boozy notes, but oth-
ers found the pure extracts too
alcohol-forward.
Additionally, vanillin is only one
of the roughly 250 flavor volatiles
found in pure extract. When the
Vanilla beans, which are the seed pods produced by a vine related to the flavor is extracted from the pods,
orchid, are pollinated and harvested by hand. everything comes along for the
ride. We often liked the direction
from components of clove oil, wood pulp, or other they went in—our top-rated pure extract was “floral”
sources, but most of the world’s supply is derived and “woodsy”—but sometimes the flavors were a
from petroleum. According to Matt Hartings, asso- bit askew. Notes such as banana, cotton candy, and
ciate professor of chemistry at American University, almond weren’t welcomed in a classic vanilla pud-
the vanillin is diluted with a liquid such as alcohol ding. Overall, our tasters favored simple vanilla flavor
or propylene glycol, and some producers add other over busier-tasting products.
flavorings, such as cocoa or tea extracts, for complex-
ity of flavor. Caramel coloring is also usually added So, Which Vanilla Should You Buy?
to make the clear vanillin look more like pure extract. Well, it’s complicated. In a head-to-head battle
between our top-rated imitation vanilla product,
The Surprising Results Baker’s, and our top-rated pure extract, Simply
For the most part, our tasters could not tell the dif- Organic Pure Vanilla Extract, the imitation product
ference between real and fake vanilla flavor. Dr. Bill won both times. Even our editor in chief, Dan Souza
Carroll, adjunct professor of chemistry at Indiana (yes, I’m throwing you under the bus, Dan), came
University, said he’s not surprised. Vanillin that is out of the cake tasting and said, “Who knew? I like
synthesized in a lab is identical at the molecular level imitation vanilla.” But Simply Organic was still good,
to vanillin derived from an orchid and thus will taste as were many of the other pure extracts. Like taste in
the same. music, it’s a personal choice. Do you want to listen to
PHOTOGRAPHY: COURTESY OF CAROLYN LOCHHEAD
We had vanillin levels tested at an indepen- a soloist or a symphony? Some people will never buy
dent lab and found that the imitation products an imitation vanilla because it’s made from petroleum,
ranged from 0.32 to 0.64 grams of vanillin per because it’s not “real,” because it’s not as interesting
100 milliliters; the pure extracts had just 0.03 to or complex, or because they want to support small
0.10 grams per 100 milliliters—so the product with farmers. Others simply cannot justify the price of
the most vanillin had 21 times as much as the product pure vanilla extract, and that’s fair, too. And still oth-
with the least. In general, we liked stronger vanilla ers, perhaps the data-driven among us, will purchase
flavor. Baker’s Imitation Vanilla Flavor, which had solely based on the rankings from our blind taste tests.
the second-highest vanillin level at 0.58 grams per For that reason, we’ve named two winners: Baker’s
100 milliliters, was our overall favorite. But there was Imitation Vanilla Flavor ($0.98 for 8 fluid ounces)
something interesting about Baker’s ingredient list: is our winning imitation vanilla product, and Simply
It included vanillin as well as ethyl vanillin. Chemists Organic Pure Vanilla Extract ($12.99 for 4 fluid
we spoke with said this vanillin has been modified to ounces) is our winning pure vanilla extract. Which
be two and a half to three times stronger; Hartings team are you on?
COOK’S ILLUSTRATED
24
 TASTING VANILLA PRODUCTS
We tested 10 top-selling vanillas, including seven pure vanilla extracts and three imitation vanilla products, priced from $0.12 to $6.19 per luid ounce. Tasters tried
each one in our Classic Vanilla Pudding and Quick and Rich Vanilla Frosting. Then we tried the top extract and top imitation product in our Vanilla Icebox Cookies
and Flufy Yellow Layer Cake. An independent lab measured vanillin levels in grams per 100 milliliters; ingredient and bean origin information was taken from product
packaging or conirmed by company representatives. Prices were paid in Boston-area supermarkets and online. We averaged the tasting scores, and products appear
below in order of preference.
RECOMMENDED
BAKER’S Imitation Vanilla Flavor WINNING
IMITATION
PRICE: $0.98 for 8 fl oz ($0.12 per fl oz) VANILLA
STYLE: Imitation VANILLIN: 0.58 g
INGREDIENTS: Water, propylene glycol, vanillin, caramel color,
0.1% sodium benzoate (added as a preservative), phosphoric acid,
and ethyl vanillin
COMMENTS: This was the only imitation product to use two differ-
ent kinds of synthetic vanillin, and tasters approved. “Good vanilla
presence, lovely overall flavor,” said one. “Rich but not too power-
ful,” said another. Tasters noted some nuance and a pleasantly bitter
aftertaste, but overall comparisons were minimal: just “classic vanilla
flavor here”; “some complexity, some depth, not trying too hard.”
SIMPLY ORGANIC Pure Vanilla Extract WINNING
PURE
PRICE: $12.99 for 4 fl oz ($3.25 per fl oz) EXTRACT
STYLE: Pure (Madagascar) VANILLIN: 0.08 g
INGREDIENTS: Organic vanilla bean extractives in water, organic alcohol
COMMENTS: This bold extract had its friends and its foes. First off,
it was boozy. “Too much alcohol, not enough bean,” said one taster.
Another disagreed: “Very expensive- and original-tasting, like pudding
from a fancy restaurant.” A third was pragmatic: “At least you can’t
be plagued with those, ‘Wait! Did I remember to add the vanilla?’
doubts.” Described as buttery, pepperminty, bright, floral, rich, and
slightly bitter, overall this “full-flavored” extract earned praise for an
“elegant, interesting, and complex” flavor.
MCCORMICK Pure Vanilla Extract
PRICE: $12.38 for 2 fl oz ($6.19 per fl oz)
STYLE: Pure (Madagascar) VANILLIN: 0.07 g
INGREDIENTS: Vanilla bean extractives in water, alcohol
COMMENTS: This extract was “mellow,” with milder vanilla flavor but
interesting nuance: slightly nutty, toasty, woodsy, oaky, and floral, with
notes of anise, rose water, and subtle warm spices. “Tastes richer,
more nuanced, almost smoky,” said one taster.
PENZEYS Vanilla Extract Single-Strength
PRICE: $11.95 for 2 fl oz ($5.98 per fl oz)
STYLE: Pure (Madagascar) VANILLIN: 0.05 g
INGREDIENTS: Water, alcohol, sugar, vanilla bean extractives
COMMENTS: This product had a classic vanilla flavor with some addi-
tional complexity in a supporting role. It was “a touch bitter in a good
way” and “slightly floral,” with warmer notes of caramel and a “hint”
of booziness, in the vein of rum and bourbon. It made frosting and
pudding taste sweeter than other products.
SIMPLY ORGANIC Non-Alcoholic Vanilla Flavoring
PRICE: $15.99 for 4 fl oz ($4.00 per fl oz)
STYLE: Flavoring (Madagascar) VANILLIN: 0.10 g
INGREDIENTS: Organic glycerine, organic vanilla bean extractives
in water
COMMENTS: This vanilla is called a “flavoring” instead of a “pure
vanilla extract” even though it’s made with real vanilla beans because
the FDA mandates that pure vanilla extract be 35 percent alcohol. It
uses glycerine (a lightly sweet, colorless, odorless, viscous liquid) as
an extracting medium instead. Tasters said it was “faintly floral,” with
notes of caramel; it was “not very complex but [had a] nice intensity
of warm, sweet, vanilla flavor.”
JANUARY
RECOMMENDED (CONTINUED)
FRONTIER Organic Vanilla Extract, Indonesia
PRICE: $8.87 for 2 fl oz ($4.44 per fl oz)
STYLE: Pure (Indonesia) VANILLIN: 0.10 g
INGREDIENTS: Water, organic alcohol, organic vanilla bean extractives
COMMENTS: This pure extract was fruity, lingering, and evocative.
Tasters compared its flavor to those of bananas, Fruity Pebbles, and
bubble gum. Some appreciated the robust combination of flavors; oth-
ers wished for more classic vanilla flavor with less background noise.
MCCORMICK Vanilla Flavor—Premium
PRICE: $3.99 for 2 fl oz ($2.00 per fl oz)
STYLE: Imitation VANILLIN: 0.32 g
INGREDIENTS: Water, alcohol (26%), natural flavorings (including
extractives of cocoa and tea), vanillin and other artificial flavorings, corn
syrup, caramel color
COMMENTS: Tasters described this imitation vanilla as “caramel-y” and
“boozy,” with notes of cherry cola and tropical fruit. (This complexity is
likely due to the addition of “natural” and “artificial” flavorings.) Despite
this product’s relatively high vanillin level, some tasters found the pri-
mary vanilla notes to be “a touch weak.”
R E C O M M E N D E D W I T H R E S E R VAT I O N S
WATKINS Original Gourmet Baking Vanilla
with Pure Vanilla Extract
PRICE: $4.99 for 2 fl oz ($2.50 per fl oz)
STYLE: Imitation and pure (Madagascar and Indonesia) VANILLIN: 0.64 g
INGREDIENTS: Water, sugar, propylene glycol, vanilla extract (water,
alcohol, extractives of vanilla beans), alcohol, artificial flavors, fruit
juice (color)
COMMENTS: This extract sang one note—VANILLA!—and sang it
loudly. It likely uses a combination of pure extract and synthetic vanil-
lin (which would fall under “artificial flavors” on the ingredient list),
although the company wouldn’t confirm this. Some tasters thought its
bold flavor was a heady foil that balanced butter and sugar in desserts,
others found it “fake,” like “vanilla invented in a lab.”
NIELSEN-MASSEY Madagascar Bourbon
Pure Vanilla Extract
PRICE: $19.99 for 4 fl oz ($5.00 per fl oz)
STYLE: Pure (Madagascar) VANILLIN: 0.05 g
INGREDIENTS: Water, alcohol (35% minimum), vanilla bean extracts
COMMENTS: The classic vanilla flavor in this extract was “mild and
delicate,” but tasters also picked out notes of caramel, rum, flowers,
cherries, warm spices, and almonds. It certainly had nuance. Some
found this complexity interesting, and others said it was “weird,” but
almost everyone wished the classic vanilla notes were stronger.
MORTON & BASSETT SPICES
Pure Vanilla Extract
PRICE: $19.99 for 4 fl oz ($5.00 per fl oz)
STYLE: Pure (Madagascar and Uganda) VANILLIN: 0.03 g
INGREDIENTS: Water, alcohol (35% minimum), vanilla bean extractives
COMMENTS: This “subtle” extract had the lowest vanillin level; it made
pudding and frosting taste sweeter without bold vanilla flavor and extra
complexity to balance things out. It was also boozy, which was divisive—
some said it had a “nice sharpness,” while others found it “harsh.”
& FEBRUARY 2019
25
 Do You Need a Burr Grinder?
Coffee aicionados have long debated the best brewing method,
but is the secret to great coffee all in the grind?
I
f you want the freshest, most full-flavored
cup of coffee, we always recommend grind-
ing your own coffee beans. It’s best to do
this right before you brew, as our testing
has shown that the beans begin to lose flavor and
aroma within an hour of being ground.
Home grinders come in two styles: blade and
burr. A blade grinder works like a tiny food proces-
sor, with a rapidly spinning blade that chops coffee
beans into smaller and smaller fragments. You have
to hold the grind button down, time the grind, shake
the grinder periodically to distribute the beans, and
inspect the ground coffee to see if it’s reached the
desired consistency.
While a blade grinder has one chamber where you
load, grind, and dispense the beans, a burr grinder
consists of three components: a hopper where you
feed in the beans, the grinding chamber, and a remov-
able container that holds the grounds so you can
transfer them to the coffee maker. You simply switch
the machine on and whole beans are pulled from
the hopper through two gear-like metal rings (called
burrs) that spin and crush the coffee, similar to the
way a pepper mill grinds peppercorns. The setting you
choose on the machine determines the space between
the burrs and thus the size of the grind.
Burr grinders are the norm in the coffee indus-
try, and now household brands such as Breville,
Hamilton Beach, and KitchenAid are offering them
for home users. To find out more about this popular
grinding method, we tested 10 models priced from
$29.86 to $199.99, all with metal burrs and at least
eight grind settings, and compared them to our
favorite blade grinder from Krups.
Grinding Coarse, Medium, and Fine Coffee
Brew method usually dictates grind setting:
Generally, coarse coffee is used for French press,
medium for drip machines, and fine for espresso. A
good grinder should be able to produce these three
consistencies, so we ground coffee on the settings
recommended by each manufacturer for coarse,
medium, and fine. We repeated the grinding tests
with light roasted beans and very dark roasted beans,
which have different densities. Finally, we had six
testers—from novices to coffee experts—operate
each grinder to gauge its user-friendliness.
Almost every model was able to achieve these three
consistencies, but many were confusing or a pain to
use. Some sprayed grounds everywhere, even with
their collection containers properly in place. Others
j BY L A U R E N S AV O I E k
had displays that were befuddling Burr and Blade: Two Types of Cofee Grinders
or hard to read, and some had
grounds containers that were too Like a pepper mill, a burr grinder employs two metal rings (burrs) that spin
small or irregularly shaped, so against each other to grind whole beans. A blade grinder is similar to a food
they overfilled easily or poured processor, with a blade that spins in a chamber containing the beans.
imprecisely when we transferred
the grounds to the brewer.
Some grinders fell short in
other ways. One had a built-in
scale that promised to dispense
the exact desired amount of beans.
However, our lab-calibrated scale
confirmed that the grinder missed
the target weight by 10 percent
every time, even after we reset its BURR GRINDER BLADE GRINDER
internal scale. Another grinder
shook heavily, rattling the table
and changing its grind setting. Finally, one model’s each made a good cup and tasters were split on
glass grounds container shattered when we acciden- which one they preferred. To verify these surprising
tally elbowed it off the counter. We don’t expect results, we conducted this test three additional times.
small appliances to be bulletproof, but we’d hope We also brought in coffee tasting experts, and they
our grinder could survive groggy morning mishaps. came to the same conclusion.
Our favorite grinders were intuitive and easy to So if the evenness of your grind doesn’t matter
use; had roomy, sturdy plastic grounds containers all that much, why is the coffee industry so excited
that could withstand a morning drop; and ground about burr grinders? With their range of settings
cleanly without making messes of our kitchens. and streamlined designs, which require the beans to
pass through the grinder only once, burr grinders
Measuring Coffee Evenness can guarantee consistency day after day in a way
One of the much-touted benefits of burr grinders that blade grinders can’t. Ultimately, we think a
is their ability to produce an extremely even grind, good burr grinder is a useful tool for home brewers
since each bean passes through the burrs only once to have for two reasons: These machines are easy to
compared to the repeated whacking the beans use, and they produce a consistent cup of coffee. And
undergo in a blade grinder. To get a read on even- even though grind evenness isn’t the most important
ness, we ground coffee on a medium-grind setting factor in how your coffee tastes, we also gave an edge
and sifted the grounds in a Kruve Sifter, a device to grinders that left no whole or partially processed
used by coffee professionals that separates the large beans in our grind (a waste of good coffee).
pieces (“boulders”), medium pieces, and dust-like
particles (“fines”). We repeated this test, tweaking Two Great Grinders
the grind setting until we had grounds that con- We found several burr grinders we liked, with the
tained the highest percentage of medium pieces. Baratza Encore ($139.00) leading the pack. The
The grinders in our lineup produced grounds rang- darling of the coffee industry, this machine produces
ing from 28 percent to 88 percent medium pieces. a very even grind, but we particularly appreciated its
But does this evenness even matter? To find out, simple design and no-fuss grinding: Choose your
we brewed three batches of coffee using the same grind setting, add your beans, and you’re done. We
ILLUSTRATION: JAY LAYMAN
beans ground in the most even burr grinder, the least also liked that it has 40 grind settings, giving coffee
even burr grinder, and our top-rated blade grinder, aficionados the ability to customize their cups. Our
which achieved up to 46 percent medium pieces. We Best Buy, the Capresso Infinity Conical Burr Grinder
kept all the variables the same except for the grinder. ($99.99), is also intuitive, but with 16 settings, it
A panel of 21 tasters then sampled the coffees in a doesn’t work well when grinding coffee for a single
blind tasting. The verdict was surprising: Though we cup. Either of these machines will round out your set
identified flavor differences in the batches of coffee, of coffee tools and elevate your brew.
COOK’S ILLUSTRATED
26
 TESTING BURR GRINDERS
We purchased 10 burr grinders priced from $29.86 to $199.99 and used each to grind cofee beans of diferent densities on ine, medium, and coarse settings. We also
ground and sifted 10-gram batches of cofee in each model until we found the grind setting on each that produced the highest percentage of medium-size pieces. Six users
tried the top four cofee grinders and gave feedback about grind size and ease of use. A panel of 21 tasters sampled cofee made from beans ground in the least even and
most even cofee grinders; we standardized the weight of the ground cofee, the brew method, and the type of beans. We repeated the test three times to conirm the
results. Finally, we removed the burrs from all the grinders, inspecting their shape and size; measured the capacity of each bean hopper using whole beans; and measured
the capacity of each grounds container using ground cofee. Results were averaged, and products appear below in order of preference.

EASE OF USE: RECOMMENDED

Our favorite products
BARATZA Encore CAPRESSO Ininity Conical DE’LONGHI Dedica BREVILLE The Smart
had clear and intuitive Burr Grinder, Black Stainless Steel Conical Burr Grinder Pro
MODEL: 485 PRICE: $139.00
controls and were easy
NUMBER OF GRIND SETTINGS: 40 MODEL: #560.01 PRICE: $99.99 Grinder MODEL: BCG820BSSXL
to operate, adjust, and HIGHEST PERCENTAGE OF NUMBER OF GRIND SETTINGS: 16 MODEL: KG 521.M PRICE: $199.95
program. Lower marks MEDIUM PIECES: 88% HIGHEST PERCENTAGE OF PRICE: $158.99 NUMBER OF GRIND SETTINGS: 60
went to products with EASE OF USE: ++ MEDIUM PIECES: 69% NUMBER OF GRIND SETTINGS: 18 HIGHEST PERCENTAGE OF
confusing displays, a GRINDING: +++ EASE OF USE: ++ HIGHEST PERCENTAGE OF MEDIUM PIECES: 73%
GRINDING: ++½ MEDIUM PIECES: 67% EASE OF USE: ++
lengthy setup process, CLEANUP: ++½
CLEANUP: ++½ EASE OF USE: +½ GRINDING: +½
or superluous design This grinder is
bare-bones: Just select This machine has GRINDING: ++½ CLEANUP: +++
features.
one of the 40 grind only 16 grind set- CLEANUP: +++ Novice testers felt
settings and turn it tings, but we liked This model offers a confident using this
GRINDING: on; it mills beans until that each was BEST mostly digital interface machine with its digital
We ground 10 grams you turn it off. It was clearly labeled. Its BUY to take the guesswork display as a guide.
too minimal for novice dial timer doses the out of grinding, but the Once set, it auto-
of cofee beans on testers who wanted correct amount of numbers were visible matically dispenses
every grind setting. more guidance, but coffee beans for only when looking the right amount of
Products that had its no-fuss design is the number of cups from directly overhead. ground coffee beans
a range of settings perfect for experi- you’re brewing (two The machine kept based on user prefer-
enced users. It doesn’t cups or more). Its ground coffee neatly ences. However, its
and were capable include a scale, so you grounds container contained, and we settings for coarse
of achieving coarse, need to weigh beans was a little small and liked that its grounds grinding were much
medium, and ine cof- beforehand. slightly awkward to container came with finer than we would
clean. a lid. have liked.
fee rated higher. We
also gave a slight edge
R E C O M M E N D E D W I T H R E S E R VAT I O N S
to grinders that
produced an even OXO Conical Burr Grinder with Integrated Scale ++
EASE OF USE: This model has an intuitive dial and simple interface. Its high-
grind, with no whole MODEL: 8710200 PRICE:$199.99 GRINDING: +++ lighted feature, a built-in scale, didn’t live up to the hype as it
was consistently off target by 10 percent. (A second machine
or partially ground NUMBER OF GRIND SETTINGS: 15 CLEANUP: +
was off by 6 percent.) An air gap between the machine and the
beans left over. HIGHEST PERCENTAGE OF MEDIUM PIECES: 73% container allowed ground coffee to spray onto the counter.

BODUM Burr Cofee Grinder +

EASE OF USE: This compact grinder uses a dial timer but can run for only
CLEANUP: 20 seconds before it has to be reset—a pain if you’re making
MODEL: 10903-73-1 PRICE: $80.00 GRINDING: +++
Lowest marks went to NUMBER OF GRIND SETTINGS: 12 CLEANUP: ++
more than a couple of cups of coffee. Though it ground the
products that sprayed beans evenly, it sometimes sprayed ground coffee onto the
HIGHEST PERCENTAGE OF MEDIUM PIECES: 75% counter, and its container was small.
cofee onto the coun-
ter or had grounds KITCHENAID Burr Grinder ++
EASE OF USE: This product has the fewest grind settings and an atypical
MODEL: KCG0702ER PRICE: $189.99 GRINDING: ++½ design—a vertical flat burr fed by an auger, a spinning cork-
containers that were
screw-shaped rod. Our biggest frustration was its grounds
diicult to clean. Our NUMBER OF GRIND SETTINGS: 8 CLEANUP: +
container, which was made of glass. We accidentally shat-
favorite products HIGHEST PERCENTAGE OF MEDIUM PIECES: 77% tered it within a few hours of the start of testing.
operated cleanly from N OT R E C O M M E N D E D
start to inish.
CUISINART Supreme Grind Automatic Burr Mill ++
EASE OF USE: This model’s flimsy burr produced a powdery, gritty mess of
MODEL: DBM-8 PRICE: $39.99 GRINDING: + ground beans. It was also tricky to use: To make one cup of
coffee, we had to center the dial between “off ” and “2 cups.”
NUMBER OF GRIND SETTINGS: 18 CLEANUP: +
HIGHEST PERCENTAGE OF MEDIUM PIECES: 30%

HAMILTON BEACH Burr Grinder Stainless Steel ++

EASE OF USE: This model produced powdery clumps of ground beans that
MODEL: 80382 PRICE: $39.99 GRINDING:+ were a pain to clean out of the container. Its automatic set-
tings offered no option for grinding one cup’s worth of beans.
NUMBER OF GRIND SETTINGS: 18 CLEANUP: +
HIGHEST PERCENTAGE OF MEDIUM PIECES: 28%

KRUPS Professional Burr Grinder +

EASE OF USE: This machine’s built-in dosing system consistently gave us
S E E H OW T H E nearly double the amount of coffee we’d normally use. The
MODEL: GX500050 PRICE:
$29.86 GRINDING: +
T E S T I N G WA S D O N E grind was very uneven, with clumps of powder interspersed
NUMBER OF GRIND SETTINGS: 9 CLEANUP: +
CooksIllustrated.com/FEB19 with nearly whole beans.
HIGHEST PERCENTAGE OF MEDIUM PIECES: 39%

JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019

27
 I NG RE D I E N T NOT E S
j B Y S T E V E D U N N , A N D R E A G E A R Y, A N D R E W J A N J I G I A N , L A N L A M & A N N I E P E T I T O k

Tasting Unsweetened
Chocolate
Unsweetened chocolate is typically made from 100 percent fermented and
roasted cacao nibs that have been ground into a paste, melted, and solidiied
into a bar. We rely on this kind of chocolate to pack in rich chocolate lavor What to Do with Daikon
without added sweetness. A staple of Asian cuisine, the long white root known as daikon (Japanese for “big
We’ve long stocked Hershey’s Kitchens Unsweetened Chocolate Baking root”) may look like a pale carrot, but it’s actually a member of the Brassicacaea fam-
Bar in the test kitchen, but in the years since we named it our favorite, it has ily, which also includes radishes, broccoli, turnips, and cabbage. With its sharp, slightly
become diicult to ind—according to the manufacturer, it is now sold in only bitter taste and lightly crunchy texture, daikon is often pickled for use as a condiment
20 states. We wondered if there was another option that would be just as (including for our Korean Marinated Beef [Bulgogi] on page 7). Once peeled and sliced
good (or better) and more widely available, so we rounded up ive unsweet- thin, grated, or cut into matchsticks, it can also be eaten raw in salads and on sand-
ened chocolates priced from $0.62 to $1.35 per ounce, including Hershey’s. wiches. In Asian cooking, daikon is frequently used in stir-fries, curries, and soups. We
We tasted them blind in our One-Minute Hot Fudge Sauce—a simple recipe found that you can also substitute daikon for ordinary round white turnips in stews and
of unsweetened chocolate and sweetened condensed milk—and in our other applications—just make sure it’s part of a mix of vegetables so that its pungency
Classic Brownies. isn’t overpowering and all the water it throws of doesn’t impact consistency. –A.P.
Tasters didn’t note much diference in the textures of the brownies, but
they did notice subtle lavor diferences in the fudge sauces. Some were rich
and sweet, “like a superthick hot cocoa” or “melted candy.” Others were Prepping Mushrooms for Sautéing
slightly bitter, with a hint of tang. One sauce was so acidic that it was almost We cut each of these mushrooms to maximize lat surfaces for browning. Note that
sour, with fruity and tropical notes of banana and citrus. In brownies, our we don’t bother to cut the stems from white or cremini mushrooms, as they are
favorite products exhibited “warm spice notes,” with no bitter or sour lavors. tender enough to eat. Be sure to try the mushrooms in our recipes on page 15. –L.L.
All the products had similar amounts of fat, protein, and carbohydrates,
but chocolate’s lavor can vary depending on several factors, including the
variety of cacao bean used and where the beans were grown. Unfortunately,
manufacturers were tight-lipped on these details. Our tasters preferred
chocolates that made “familiar” and “classic”-tasting fudge sauce and brown-
ies. We still like Hershey’s, but our new winner, Baker’s Unsweetened Baking
Chocolate Bar 100%, came out on top thanks to its “perfectly balanced,” “full
fudgy lavor.” Our top two products are shown below. −Lauren Savoie
PORTOBELLO OYSTER
RECOMMENDED 1. Leave gills intact. (Scrape out gills with 1. Trim any tough bottom parts of
spoon when they might muddy appear- stems, separating caps from stems irst if
BAKER’S Unsweetened Baking ance of dish; when sautéing, muddiness mushrooms come in clump.
Chocolate Bar 100% Cacao won’t be noticeable.) Remove stems. 2. Tear caps along gills (this results in
PRICE: $2.99 for 4 oz ($0.75 per oz)
2. Halve each cap, then cut each half more attractive pieces than cutting) into
COMMENTS: Tasters praised Baker’s for its
“familiar,” “classic” flavor. Hot fudge sauce crosswise into ½-inch pieces. 1- to 1½-inch pieces.
made with this chocolate was rich” and
“caramel-y,” and tasters thought its brownies had a
“deep, cocoa-y flavor.” “It’s just pretty much a perfect
brownie,” said one taster.

HERSHEY’S Kitchens Unsweetened

Chocolate Baking Bar
PRICE: $3.49 for 4 oz ($0.87 per oz)
COMMENTS: Our previous favorite still
stood out for its “fudgy” richness and subtle
notes of “coconut,” “espresso,” and “milk
MAITAKE SHIITAKE WHITE AND CREMINI
chocolate.” Tasters thought brownies made
with this chocolate were “decadent” and “well 1. Trim base to release 1. Remove stems. 1. Trim woody ends
balanced.” It’s available in only 20 states (though individual fronds. 2. Quarter large caps; from stems.
you can purchase it online) but is a good option for 2. Cut each frond into halve smaller caps. 2. Quarter large or
baking if you can find it.
1- to 1½-inch pieces. medium mushrooms;
halve smaller mushrooms.

COOK’S ILLUSTRATED

28
Alternate Uses for Cocktail Bitters
Traditional cocktail bitters such as Angostura or Peychaud’s
add bracing medicinal complexity and complementary bitter-
ness to mixed drinks. Traditionally made by infusing alcohol
with aromatic herbs and spices (though some manufacturers
use synthetic lavorings and glycerin, an alcohol-free liquid),
they are intensely lavored and meant to be used in small
doses. These days, bitters come in a range of enticing lavors,
from peach to black walnut to pumpkin pie spice, which
prompted us to try them in nonalcoholic applications. They
worked beautifully in lavored seltzer, whipped cream, crème
anglaise, and meringue cookies. They were less successful as a substitute for extracts in higher-heat
baked applications such as pound cake, where tasters detected unpleasant (rather than complex)
bitterness. Here are a couple of tips to keep in mind when using bitters as a lavoring agent.
( When making seltzer, whipped cream, or crème anglaise, use 2 to 3 teaspoons of bitters per cup.
( If using bitters in an application that calls for an extract, substitute an equal amount.
( Do not expose bitters to prolonged cooking or high heat (gentle simmering and oven temperatures
below 300 degrees are ine), as too much heat can drive of lighter aromas and leave behind unpleas-
ant bitterness. Add the bitters at the end of cooking when possible. –L.L.
Repurposing Pickle Brine
When you buy a jar of pickles, you’re paying for the vegetables—and for the pickling liquid.
We’ve already found that you can repurpose the brine to make another batch of pickles. But
since the main ingredients in most pickling brines—vinegar, salt, and sugar—are all efective
lavor enhancers, you can also use the leftover liquid to add zing in all kinds of applications.
Drizzle dill pickle juice over warm potatoes before making potato salad. Add pepperoncini
juice to a Bloody Mary or a pan sauce. Instead of spritzing lemon juice on your steamed
vegetables or your grilled ish or chicken, add a little of the liquid from pickled jalapeños.
Note: The vinegar in brine is slightly diluted by water pulled from the vegetables, so you can’t
substitute it one-for-one with vinegar or lemon juice. Also, some brines are extremely salty,
so if your recipe calls for salt, withhold it and season to taste at the end. –A.G.
When to Substitute Fresh Pasta for Dried
Many cooks assume that a good-quality fresh pasta is always the best choice and may casually
substitute it in recipes calling for dried. Here’s why that may not be a good idea: Because fresh
pasta is made from eggs and white wheat lour, it has a tender, delicate texture, which makes it far
less versatile than dried pasta. The latter is made from water and semolina lour, which gives it a
stronger gluten structure and a sturdier texture. Always use fresh pasta in recipes that call for it,
as the success of the dish likely depends on it. And use these guidelines when deciding whether to
substitute it for dried. –A.J.
( DO feel free to substitute fresh pasta for dried when serving it with sauces that have a ine,
uniform texture, such as pesto or ground meat ragus. Because cooked fresh pasta doesn’t absorb
water like dried does, be conservative when adding pasta cooking water to the accompanying pasta
sauce, or the sauce might end up being too loose.
( DO use 24 ounces of fresh pasta for every 16 ounces of dried.
( DON’T substitute fresh pasta for dried in recipes that require vigorous stirring of pasta with
sauce to release starch and create a creamy consistency (such as cacio e pepe); such stirring can
break fresh strands.
( DON’T substitute fresh pasta in dishes with large components such as broccoli or sausage.
Because of its softer texture, fresh pasta tends to clump, so components won’t combine evenly.
STRONG AND STURDY TENDER AND DELICATE
In cacio e pepe, dried pasta stays intact. In the same recipe, fresh pasta breaks apart.
JANUARY & FEBRUARY
29
DIY RECIPE Nut Butters
Making nut butters at home couldn’t be simpler—just grind the
nuts to a paste in a food processor. Plus, you can customize the
nut butters to your taste and make varieties that aren’t readily
available in stores.
Be aware that hard, dense nuts such as almonds can take as
long as 20 minutes to process to a smooth paste—but don’t
worry, it will happen eventually. We found that toasting the nuts
before grinding them not only boosts their lavor but also warms
their oils, allowing for faster breakdown during processing. (We
also warm preroasted nuts for this reason.) Certain nuts require
thinning with oil or thickening with water to create a spread-
able consistency (see “Thicken Homemade Nut Butter with . . .
Water?” on page 30 for more information). –S.D.
NUT PROCESSING TIME
Almonds 18–20 min
Cashews 10–12 min
Hazelnuts 3–4 min
Peanuts 3–4 min
Pecans 2–3 min
Pistachios 8–10 min
HOMEMADE NUT BUTTER
SERVES 16 TOTAL TIME: 30 TO 40 MINUTES,
PLUS 10 MINUTES COOLING
We do not recommend using walnuts in this recipe, as their
skins impart a bitter lavor to the butter. You can use blanched,
skin-on, raw, or preroasted nuts here, but do not use salted nuts.
The weight of 4 cups of nuts may vary depending on the type of
nuts you use. You can customize your nut butter in one of two
ways: by using a blend of nuts or by adding ¼ to ½ teaspoon of
ground cinnamon, nutmeg, or ginger or ⅛ teaspoon of cayenne
pepper to the nuts before processing in step 2.
4 cups (1¼ pounds) whole unsalted nuts
1 teaspoon honey, plus extra for seasoning
¾ teaspoon kosher salt
1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to
375 degrees. Spread nuts in single layer on rimmed baking sheet
and roast until fragrant and slightly darkened, 10 to 12 minutes,
rotating sheet halfway through roasting. (If using preroasted nuts,
place in oven for 5 minutes to warm.) Transfer sheet to wire
rack and let nuts cool slightly, about 10 minutes.
2. Process nuts in food processor until oil is released and
paste begins to form, scraping down sides of bowl often. Add
honey and salt and continue to process to desired smoothness,
2 to 20 minutes longer, depending on nut variety. Season with
extra honey and salt to taste. If butter is thicker than desired,
thin by adding vegetable oil, 1 teaspoon at a time, pulsing 3 times
after each addition, until desired consistency is reached. If butter
is thinner than desired, thicken by adding water, 1 teaspoon at a
time, pulsing 3 times after each addition, until desired consistency
is reached. Transfer to jar with tight-itting lid. Butter can be
stored at room temperature or refrigerated for up to 2 months.
2019
 KIT CH E N NOT E S
j B Y S T E V E D U N N , A N D R E A G E A R Y, A N D R E W J A N J I G I A N , L A N L A M & A N N I E P E T I T O k

WHAT IS IT?
A fellow test cook’s
grandmother sent
in a metal mold
measuring 10 by 3 by
3 inches for us to
identify. Since the mold
lacked a top enclosure but
had a removable bottom and
pull-apart sides held in place by two removable
pins, we determined it to be a mold for pâté en croûte (French for “pâté in
a pastry crust”). These molds come in many shapes and sizes, with most being
rectangular or oval. To remove a pâté en croûte from a mold, simply remove
the pins and separate the sides. The sides are textured—another deining fea-
ture—and leave a signature decorative imprint on the pastry.
Pâté en croûte is usually enjoyed as an appetizer and can range from a
simple afair to a complex masterpiece. The mold is irst lined with pastry,
then illed with a pâté stuing, and inally topped with more pastry and
baked. Pork is a common illing, along with rabbit or poultry, and is
sometimes combined with foie gras, mushrooms, olives,
and even nuts. I hadn’t made a pâté en
croûte since cooking school
in France, but neverthe-
less I was able to craft a
delicious, if rather simple,
duck-based version with
PÂTÉ EN this mold, which worked
CROÛTE MOLD beautifully. –S.D.
Thicken Homemade Nut Butter with . . . Water?
While developing our Homemade Nut Butter recipe (page 29), we found that the
pecan and hazelnut butters needed to be thickened after grinding to create a pleasingly
spreadable consistency. That’s because both nuts have more fat than the other variet-
ies we tested. Hazelnuts have 18 grams of fat per ounce and pecans have 20 grams
per ounce, while the other nuts we used (peanuts, cashews, almonds, and pistachios)
averaged 13.5 grams of fat per ounce. And here’s the interesting thing: To thicken
these runny butters, we used water. Nut butters are emulsions, which means they
consist of droplets of one liquid (in this case water) dispersed in another liquid (here,
oil). Adding more of the dispersed liquid creates more droplets, which bump into each
other when the emulsion is stirred or poured, making it thicker. That’s why when we
added 2 teaspoons of water to our homemade hazelnut butter, it transformed from a
liquid that dripped of a knife into a solid schmear that stayed put. –S.D.
Eking Out Extra Stock
The standard procedure when making stock at
home is to discard the solids after pressing out
as much liquid as possible. But frugal restaurant
chefs know better: They often “rinse” the solids
with a small amount of water before discarding
them and add that extra liquid to the stock. The
solids have lavorful residue clinging to their rela-
tively abundant surfaces that is transferred to the
water. While this “rinsing liquid” is not as concen-
trated as stock, in the appropriate proportion, it’s
still surprisingly lavorful.
To eke out more lavor from your solids, sim-
ply return them to the pot and stir in ¼ cup of RINSE CYCLE
water per pound of meat/bones. Strain the mix- Moistened stock solids contain lots of
ture and add the liquid to your stock. –L.L. flavor that’s a waste to throw away.
Homemade Nonstick Coating
Oil tends to bead up when added to a hot pan or skillet. Commercial vegetable oil
sprays, on the other hand, create a thin, even coating on cookware and bakeware
because they contain lecithin, which forms a microscopic layer surrounding the
sprayed oil droplets, helping them spread onto a surface instead of forming beads.
We heard that it’s possible to combine liquid lecithin (available at health foods
stores) and vegetable oil with an immersion blender and then use an oil mister
to spray the mixture on cookware and bakeware to prevent sticking. Our mister
clogged, but brushing the blended mixture (we used ¾ teaspoon of liquid lecithin
and ½ cup of vegetable oil) onto pans resulted in easily released muins and cakes
and fried eggs that glided across stainless-steel skillets. Note: The lecithin in our
homemade coating browned quickly, darkening the undersides of the eggs. This
doesn’t happen with commercial sprays since, in addition to oil and lecithin, they
also contain an antifoaming agent that acts as a preservative, allowing its lecithin to
be heated to higher temperatures without browning. We found that the darkening
didn’t afect the taste of the eggs, so if you don’t mind the color, it’s ine to use the
homemade coating to fry them. –L.L.
TECHNIQUE An Efficient Way to Cut on the Bias
Cutting long, slim vegetables such as carrots, asparagus, and scallions diagonally adds
visual interest to many dishes. Here’s how to produce a consistent bias cut. –A.G.

WITH WATER
ILLUSTRATION: JOHN BURGOYNE

Thick and spreadable

WITHOUT WATER
Thin and runny 1. TRIM Line up 3 or 2. ANGLE Use edge of 3. CUT Cut pieces into
4 pieces and trim ends. knife to nudge pieces into desired length, following
angle at which you’ll cut. angle established in previ-
ous step.

COOK’S ILLUSTRATED

30
Caring for Your Spice Mill SCIENCECan You Prevent Mushrooms from
In the test kitchen, we use a dedicated Absorbing Too Much Oil?
blade-style cofee mill as a spice mill. Anyone who has sautéed mushrooms knows that they’re veritable sponges,
To get the most out of your mill and seeming to absorb as much oil as you put in the pan. But while developing our
keep it in top shape, we have some new method for sautéing these fungi (page 15)—which calls for steaming them
useful tips. in water before adding any oil to the pan—we noticed that, once cooked, the
( SHAKE THE MILL GENTLY mushrooms barely absorbed any oil at all. To demonstrate this phenomenon, we
To ensure good contact with the blades carried out the following experiment. –L.L.
(particularly when grinding small amounts),
pick up the mill (grasp it well to keep the lid EXPERIMENT
on tightly) and gently tilt and shake it so the We tossed 100 grams of raw halved, trimmed white mushrooms with ¼ cup
contents sweep across the blades. of vegetable oil. After 5 minutes, we drained the mushrooms and weighed them
( USE YOUR EARS As particles get again. We repeated this treatment with another 100 grams of mushrooms that we
smaller, the sound of grinding changes from irst microwaved until they were just cooked through and then thoroughly dried.
rough and whiny to an even purr, an indicator
that the contents are evenly ground. R E S U LT S
( CLEAN THE HOPPER REGULARLY Use a ine-bristled brush to remove The raw mushrooms absorbed 42 grams of oil (about 3 tablespoons), while the
loose particles around the blades after every use. To better remove oily residue left cooked mushrooms picked up just 2 grams of
by spices, periodically grind ¼ cup of rice to a powder and then brush it out. Do not oil (about ½ teaspoon).
add water to the mill; it can leak into the motor and cause a dangerous short.
( WASH THE LID WELL Clean with soap and water (or in the dishwasher) to E X P L A N AT I O N
remove oils that can turn rancid and afect the taste of newly ground spices. –A.J. The stems and caps of mushrooms are made
up of a large network of ibers called hyphae
that are 80 to 90 percent water. This tissue
Deodorizing Silicone Ice Trays also contains numerous air pockets in which oil
Silicone ice trays make extracting ice easy, but they have one big downside: Over can collect. Cooking damages the ibers, which
time, they pick up odors from the freezer, which can give the ice an of-lavor. release water, and collapses the air pockets,
Which is why we were interested to read in The New York Times about a method for causing the mushroom to shrink. With fewer RAW MUSHROOMS
removing odors: Bake the trays for an hour in a 350-degree oven. (Silicone can with- air pockets to capture oil and less surface area Absorbed more oil
stand temperatures of up to 500 degrees, so there is no risk of the trays melting.) for oil to cling to, our cooked mushrooms
Would the method also work on more-potent odors left by items such as pesto, picked up just ½ teaspoon of oil, while the raw
chiles in adobo, or minced garlic in oil (all items we commonly freeze in small quan- mushrooms absorbed a whopping 21 times
tities in ice cube trays for later use)? To ind out, we illed silicone ice trays with a more oil.
paste of pureed onions, shallots, garlic, anchovies, and olive oil and refrigerated
them overnight. When we emptied the trays and washed them the next morning, TA K E AWAY
all still smelled strongly of the paste. We then baked them in a 350-degree oven for Our new method for sautéing takes advan-
an hour. The trick worked beautifully, eliminating all odors. We also tried alternative tage of a cooked mushroom’s inability to
deodorizing methods, such as soaking in a solution of baking soda or vinegar over- absorb much oil. We steam the mushrooms
night or boiling in water for an hour, none of which removed the smell completely. in water until they collapse. Once the pan is
Baking is a great method for removing even strong odors from ice trays. Just be dry, we add a mere ½ teaspoon of oil, which COOKED MUSHROOMS
sure your ice trays are silicone and not rubber, which will melt in a hot oven. –A.J. coats the mushrooms and helps them brown. Absorbed less oil

Tips For Browning Butter

Browning butter—cooking it until its milk solids
deepen to a dark golden brown—adds a complex,
nutty lavor to savory applications as well as to
sweet recipes such as our Browned Butter Blondies
on page 23. Here’s how to ensure success. –A.P.

USE THE RIGHT SKILLET
Don’t be tempted to use a nonstick skillet. You
need a stainless-steel or enameled cast-iron skillet
to easily monitor the color of the butter.
USE THE RIGHT BUTTER
Use only unsalted butter. Salted but-
ter foams more than unsalted does
when melted, which can make it dif-
icult to monitor the color.
SCRAPE OUT THE PAN
Much of the lavor of browned
butter is in the browned milk solids.
Make sure you get every last bit out
of the pan.
DON’T TOSS BURNT BUTTER
If your butter burns, ilter out the burnt
bits using a cofee ilter–lined ine-mesh
strainer, let the butter cool, and then
taste it. If it doesn’t taste burnt, use it
to top steamed vegetables.

JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2019

31
 EQUIPMENT CORNER
j BY L I S A M c M A N U S , E M I LY P H A R E S & K AT E S H A N N O N k

SMART

H I G H LY R E C O M M E N D E D H I G H LY R E C O M M E N D E D RECOMMENDED H I G H LY R E C O M M E N D E D

CLICK AND GROW MONBENTO MB NORDIC WARE WEBER Spirit II E-310 Gas Grill
Smart Garden 9 Square—Litchi Half Sheet Cover MODEL: 45030001
MODEL: 9 MODEL: 120003066 MODEL: 43119 PRICE: $499.00
PRICE: $199.95 PRICE: $27.99 PRICE: $10.13

Indoor Gardens Rimmed Baking Sheet Lid

Indoor gardens promise to make it easy to harvest herbs, lettuce, and other types
of small produce at home, even if you lack outdoor space or sunlight. We tested
four models priced from $189.99 to $199.95, all equipped with full-spectrum grow
lights and more or less self-watering systems. Three were “smart” gardens with
apps that helped us monitor and care for the plants. In four and a half months
of testing, two of the gardens grew just a few harvestable herbs. However, the
other two models yielded large quantities and worked with a variety of seeds. Our
favorite was the Click and Grow Smart Garden 9 ($199.95), which required the
least amount of ongoing efort. Healthy plants sprouted within a week, and we
got abundant lettuce and basil from this garden. The accompanying app was also
helpful: When we scanned the QR codes on our selected seed capsules, the app
automatically set optimal light cycles; it also alerted us when food was ready to
harvest. –L.M.
Bento-Style Lunchboxes
Bento-style lunchboxes are compartmentalized containers inspired by the Japanese
bento, a single-serving, portable boxed meal that according to some sources dates
back to the 12th century. To ind out which bento-style lunchbox is best, we selected
six widely available models ranging in size, priced from $14.99 to $40.99. Four had
individual containers that stacked vertically, while two models were single large con-
tainers with dividers inside. We put them through a series of tests and also assigned
each model an owner for one week to see how they fared in the real world with real
lunches. In the end, size and coniguration set our winner apart. The Monbento MB
Square—Litchi ($27.99) has two compartments that can be used together or sepa-
rately, with a total capacity of 8 cups—the largest in the lineup. This durable plastic
model was also the only lunchbox that proved to be leakproof. –E.P.
We often wrap rimmed baking sheets in plastic wrap or aluminum foil when
preparing food to cook later, transporting dishes to a party, or storing leftovers.
Would a lid be a handy alternative? When we learned that the manufacturer of
our favorite rimmed baking sheet made one, we ordered a few and got down to
testing. We found that the lid prevented food from drying out in the refrigerator
or freezer. It also was sturdy and durable, keeping a frosted sheet cake looking
pristine even when we stacked 10 pounds of weight on top of the lid. And though
we wished it had more than two latches for a more secure it on the sheet, it was
overall much simpler to use than plastic wrap or foil. A baking sheet has always
been one of our kitchen essentials, and this lid makes it even more versatile. –K.S.
U P D AT E Gas Grills Under $500
When we recently learned that Weber had overhauled our winning gas grill, the
Weber Spirit E-310, we bought and tested the new version, running it through the
same tests as we had our previous winner. We’re pleased to say that a good grill has
gotten even better. In the new Weber Spirit II E-310 ($499.00), the bottom slope
of the cookbox was redesigned to send grease drippings to the center of the grill,
which works better than the design of the old grill, whose drain sat of to one side
of the cookbox. The central drain results in a cleaner grill with less likelihood of a
grease ire. Weber also removed the cabinet under the cookbox, creating a much
more handy open shelf and making it easier to reach and slide out the grease trap.
Although the new model’s burners (the perforated tubes inside the grill that ignite
when the gas is turned on) put out 30,000 BTUs rather than the older model’s
32,000, we didn’t notice any decline in performance; rather, the Spirit II does an
even better job of evening out the heat distribution across the grilling surface.
Earning perfect marks, the Weber Spirit II E-310 is our new favorite gas grill. –L.M.

U.S. POSTAL SERVICE STATEMENT OF OWNERSHIP, MANAGEMENT, AND CIRCULATION

1. Publication Title: Cook’s Illustrated; 2. Publication No. 1068-2821; 3. Filing date: 10 /01/18; 4. Issue frequency: Jan/Feb, Mar/Apr, May/June, Jul/Aug, Sept/Oct, Nov/Dec; 5. Number of issues published annually: 6; 6. The annual subscription
price is $41.70; 7. Complete mailing address of known oice of publication: 21 Drydock Avenue, Suite 210E, Boston, MA 02210; 8. Complete mailing address of headquarters or general business oice of publisher: 21 Drydock Avenue, Suite 210E,
Boston, MA 02210; 9. Full names and complete mailing addresses of publisher, editor, and managing editor. Publisher, David Nussbaum, 21 Drydock Avenue, Suite 210E, Boston, MA 02210; Editor, Dan Souza, 21 Drydock Avenue, Suite 210E, Boston,
MA 02210; Managing Editor, Todd Meier, 21 Drydock Avenue, Suite 210E, Boston, MA 02210; 10. Owner: America’s Test Kitchen LP; 21 Drydock Avenue, Suite 210E, Boston, MA 02210; 11. Known bondholders, mortgages and other securities:
None. 12. Tax status: Has Not Changed During Preceding 12 Months.; 13. Publication title: Cook’s Illustrated; 14. Issue date for circulation data below: September/October 2018; 15A. Total number of copies: Average number of copies each issue
during preceding 12 months: 847,001(Sept/Oct 2018: 830,492).; B. Paid circulation: 1. Mailed outside-county paid subscriptions: 689,034(Sept/Oct 2018: 673,702); 2. Mailed in-county paid subscriptions: 0(Sept/Oct 2018: 0); 3. Sales through
dealers and carriers, street vendors and counter sales. Average number of copies each issue during the preceding 12 months: 31,453 (Sept/Oct 2018: 38,286); 4. Paid distribution through other classes mailed through the USPS. Average number
of copies each issue during the preceding 12 months: 0 (Sept/Oct 2018: 0); C. Total paid distribution. Average number of copies each issue during preceding 12 months: 720,487 (Sept/Oct 2018: 711,988); D. Free or nominal rate distribution
(by mail and outside mail). 1. Free or nominal Outside-County. Average number of copies each issue during the preceding 12 months: 3,422 (Sept/Oct 2018: 3,262). 2. Free or nominal rate in-county copies. Average number of copies each
issue during the preceding 12 months: 0 (Sept/Oct 2018: 0); 3. Free or nominal rate copies mailed at other Classes through the USPS. Average number of copies each issue during preceding 12 months: 0 (Sept/Oct 2018: 0); 4. Free or nominal
rate distribution outside the mail. Average number of copies each issue during preceding 12 months: 1,000 (Sept/Oct 2018: 1,000); E. Total free or nominal rate distribution. Average number of copies each issue during preceding 12 months:
4,422 (Sept/Oct 2018: 4,262); F. Total free distribution. Average number of copies each issue during preceding 12 months: 724,909 (Sept/Oct 2018: 716,250); G. Copies not Distributed. Average number of copies each issue during preceding 12
months: 138,516 (Sept/Oct 2018: 120,620); H. Total. Average number of copies each issue during preceding 12 months: 847,001(Sept/Oct 2018: 830,492); I. Percent paid. Average percent of copies paid for the preceding 12 months: 99.39%
(Sept/Oct 2018: 99.40%).

COOK’S ILLUSTRATED

32
 Find More Online
INDEX Online Extras include recipes, reviews,
and a complete lineup of videos.
January & February 2019 Go to CooksIllustrated.com/FEB19

MAIN DISHES Sautéed Tilapia 9 SALAD RECIPES

Brown Rice Bowl with Vegetables and
Salmon 11
Bulgur Bowl with Vegetables and
Marinated Tofu 12
Korean Marinated Beef (Bulgogi) 7
Pork, Fennel, and Lemon Ragu with
Pappardelle 5
Skillet-Roasted Chicken Breasts with
Garlicky Green Beans 13
with Harissa-Mint Carrots 13
Southwestern Brown Rice Bowl with
Vegetables and Chicken 12
SIDE DISHES
Sautéed Mushrooms with Red Wine
and Rosemary 15
with Mustard and Parsley 15
with Soy, Scallion, and Ginger 15
BREAD
Easiest-Ever Biscuits 21
Beet Salad with Goat Cheese
and Arugula 18
S N AC K
Indian-Spiced Roasted Chickpeas 19
Barbecue-Spiced 19
D E S S E RT
Browned Butter Blondies 23
A C C O M PA N I M E N T S
Chive-Lemon Miso Butter 9
Cilantro Chimichurri 9
Homemade Nut Butter 29
Beet Salad with Blue Cheese and Endive
Beet Salad with Spiced Yogurt and Watercress
Farro Bowl with Vegetables and Sausage
Quick-Cooking Beets
Sautéed Tilapia for Two
Sautéed Tilapia with Chive-Lemon Miso
Butter for Two
Sautéed Tilapia with Cilantro Chimichurri
for Two
Skillet-Roasted Chicken Breasts with
Garlic-Ginger Broccoli
Skillet-Roasted Chicken Breasts with
Garlic-Ginger Broccoli for Two
Skillet-Roasted Chicken Breasts with Garlicky
Green Beans for Two
Skillet-Roasted Chicken Breasts with
Harissa-Mint Carrots for Two
Spanish-Spiced Roasted Chickpeas

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BACK COVER ILLUSTRATED BY JOHN BURGOYNE

VIDEO
Preserved Citrus Testing Burr Cofee Grinders
Various forms of preserved citrus enhance dishes around the
N U T R I T I O N A L I N F O R M AT I O N
globe. ORANGE MARMALADE is popular in Britain and is most CooksIllustrated.com/feb19/nutrition
often made from the Spanish Seville orange. MOSTARDA is a
northern Italian mustard and fruit condiment similar to mar- RECIPE VIDEOS
Want to see how to make any of the recipes
malade that often includes oranges. Sweet canned MANDARIN in this issue? There’s a free video for that.
ORANGES are frequently used to enliven salads. DRIED ORANGE Go to CooksIllustrated.com/FEB19 and
PEEL boasts an earthy, light citrus lavor and is used in marinades, click on videos.
infusions, teas, and lavored salts; CANDIED ORANGE PEEL is
F O L LOW U S O N S O C I A L M E D I A
sweet and mildly bitter. Orange rind also makes an appear-
facebook.com/CooksIllustrated
ance in SHICHIMI TOGARASHI, a Japanese spice blend. Japanese twitter.com/TestKitchen
YUZU KOSHU is a condiment made from fermented chiles, salt, pinterest.com/TestKitchen
and yuzu, a loral, tart citrus fruit. DRIED LIMES, known as loomi, instagram.com/CooksIllustrated
impart their sour-yet-savory lavor to Middle Eastern dishes. LIME youtube.com/AmericasTestKitchen
PICKLE is a briny, sour condiment with mild heat that accompa-
nies many of India’s regional cuisines. Salty, pickled PRESERVED
LEMON is used in everything from salad dressings to tagines.

PHOTOGRAPHY: CARL TREMBLAY, STEVE KLISE; STYLING: CHANTAL LAMBETH