Cooking - Simmering

[graafen]

I absolutely adore cooking and I'm really still learning. A lot of recipies call for allowing things to "Simmer. Stir occasionally", but when I ever did that the food would stick and burn to the bottom of the pan unless I stirred constantly, which pissed me off no end.

This problem has been almost entirely solved by switching to using a copper-bottom stock pot over a saucepan! I picked one up from Argos on Friday and made a chili using it this evening, which came out so much better than ever before. The meat is so tender and the veg nice and soft!

This is one of the simple bits of culinary knowledge that I had such a hard time discovering as it seemed that everywhere took that simmering was something everyone knew. The same can be said for other things, like dicing onions and other veg.

Comments

[rustyfox.livejournal.com]

Too much heat - food is burning onto the bottom. I imagine a bigger pan is just dissipating the heat quicker.

Never had much luck with cheap thin saucepans though, and I especially hate non-stick saucepans.

TK Maxx sometimes has some decent value quality saucepans and other kitchen-ware too.

[graafen]

I haven't had much luck with saucepans that have thin bottoms. I reckon that I'll be replacing mine with copper bottom ones after seeing how well this works.

I don't particularly like non-stick pans either, except in the case of my frying pan. So much easier to fry food!

I've gotten a few things from TK Maxx's kitchen section before, which have been pretty good. :D

[rustyfox.livejournal.com]

Non-stick frying pans I can make an exception for in some cases, my large Tefal pan is so far lasting well (again I guess you get what you pay for, cheap non-stick can go sticky and come off), but the golden rule is never use any metal implements near it. Scratched non-stick means a quickly junked pan.

Never heat non-stick up too high either. That's what the wok is for!

I really keep meaning to get myself some old solid cast iron skillets though. So hard to find, I need to scour ebay. Well kept iron skillets should last for generations!

[baccala-30.livejournal.com]

I love cooking myself too, also watching cooking shows on TV. There is one of Gordon Ramseys restaurants in Leeds I believe is called "The F Word".

[graafen]

Jamie Oliver has a restaurant in Leeds, but Gordon Ramsey doesn't. All of his restaurants are in London. :)

[baccala-30.livejournal.com]

Ok thanks. :)