It's one thing to know how to move around the kitchen, but quite another to know the deepest secrets of the culinary arts, like what will make your food easier to prepare. Are you a whiz with the spatula and the knife? Let's see how many of the tricks from this checklist you know.
All you need is to pulverize the granulated sugar into a food processor or a species grinder.
Instead of checking numbers, put an egg in a glass of water: good eggs sink, bad eggs float.
Want to make banana bread but don't want to wait for the bananas to ripen? Place unpeeled bananas on a nonstick tray and stick them in the oven for a couple of minutes so that ripen quickly.
Add vinegar or lemon to make buttermilk. If that doesn't work, mix together ¾ cup of natural Greek yogurt and ¼ cup of water or skimmed milk.
A pizza cutter is great for chopping herbs like parsley and coriander and for cutting things for your kids, like pasta or pancakes.
Tired of "cutting" butter when preparing recipes for the oven? Simply freeze a packet of butter and "scratch" only what you need for your mixes using a cheese grater.
Freeze leftover wine in an ice tray to add later to your favorite stews and sauces.
Slices of the perfect size, always.
This trick also works for avocados and cheese for salads.
Add butter to the bottom of a coffee mug. Mix one egg, three tablespoons of milk and cinnamon. Put in the microwave for one minute.
Put lemons in the microwave for 15 seconds before squeezing them
Wrap bread in a paper towel and put it in the microwave for 10 seconds. Or wait until it's really hard and put it in a food processor to make your own bread crumbs.
Add some raisins and the bubbles will return to your glass.