Selected Excerpts from my Blog/Recipe page with more than 40 Posts!
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Controlling Food Costs 2.0
One major job function of professional executive chefs is to control food costs. With slim profit margins controlling food costs can make the difference between making a profit or not. There are many strategies and techniques that we use to make this happen. Some of these are very suitable for home as well and with the ever-increasing cost of food this is very important in controlling your budget at home. Here are some tips for you-
Big batch theory- Make the biggest batches of foods that can be frozen or preserved and then freeze individual portions, to save time later, with lower cost food options such as lasagnas, soups, stews, and bases like stocks, doughs and crepes.
Cross utilization – One of the strategies that chefs and restaurants use is to make dishes that cross utilize base ingredients such as mother sauces in more than one dish on the menu. The same idea goes at home and also when purchasing food staples make sure to have a plan to use them in different preparations. This way your pantry will not be full of items that you use for only one dish and then go bad after time due to infrequent use.
Preferred purchasing programs- Chefs do this by looking for companies that give additional savings on products in volume purchasing programs. At home use this plan with stores like Sam’s club or Costco to save on prices. One caution for this is to make sure you only buy items that you use often. To minimize waste of some foods that may expire or go bad if not used up in time.
Seacuterie, the art of cold seafood preservation and presentation
Seacuterie is a relatively new term for the ancient way of preserving seafood for later use. Extravagant displays can be achieved when the seafood is presented and served in an artistic fashion. Seacuterie encompasses the techniques of curing, smoking and cooking seafood which are techniques used in Garde Manger the subcategory of culinary arts which means the art of cold food preparation and presentation. Garde Manger is a subject that contains a huge number of techniques, recipes and methods, one of which is Charcuterie which traditionally focuses on cold food prepared from pork like ham, salamis, pates, etc.
The Powerful Pantry
Building a pantry supply of selected ingredients that are used for the cuisine of specific regions of the world will allow you to create dishes that are popular in these global styles of cooking. Asian, Latin and lesser-known European styles of cooking are becoming increasingly more popular throughout the US. Furthermore, the spread of ethnic world cuisine restaurants is reaching broader audiences not just in major metropolitan areas but in secondary markets as well. Having on hand specific spices, sauces and ingredients that are used to create many of the mainstream global dishes found in the Latin, Asian and European areas of the world will enable you to create exotic meals at home versus dining out. When the proper ingredients are used along with the techniques of preparation found in these regions your cooking repertoire will surely increase to the delight of your family and friends.
In this post I will concentrate on three major regions of the world. Listed below are the continent's where these countries are located that use these pantry items. Certainly, there are many more countries in these regions than those that I have listed, however these are just some of more well-known ones that use these staple items.
- Asia- China, Japan, Thailand, Vietnam and Korea
- Latin America- Mexico, Brazil, Peru, Argentina, and the Caribbean
- European- Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, France, Spain and Greece
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