A Constant Supply of Fresh Spices

Time, light, oxygen, and heat are enemies of spices.

Enemy	The Problem	Mitigations
Time	I suspect the typical spice rack harbors spices from the last millennium.	Buy tiny quantities, use within one year. For spices you use rarely, buy enough for one meal.
Light	Spice jars are usually transparent and sit on a rack on the counter or wall.	Store in a dark place.
Oxygen	Eventually a spice jar contains more oxygen than spice.	Store in small plastic bags, squeeze out any air. Buy whole rather than ground spices. This greatly reduces the exposed surface area.
Heat	A warm place (e.g., next to an oven or above a range) might be seen as a convenient spot for storing spices.	Store spices away from heat sources.

Our Personal Kitchen Assistant

Welcomed Google Assistant into our home.
Me: OK Google, cook dinner.
The Google: Sorry, I can't help you with that. pic.twitter.com/Yo9BbdB5NH

— Tom Wilson (@TomPhase3) November 30, 2016

This week we welcomed a personal assistant into our home. Or, to be more precise, FedEx delivered a Google Assistant.

It's a stubby, round box you plug into the wall. It listens for our commands and talks to us via surprisingly good speakers. It connects to Google services over WiFi.

It sits in a corner of our kitchen and has already changed how we do things.

We've eliminated the need for a paper groceries list. Instead we keep a list in Google Keep, an application I use frequently for quick notes.

Immersion Blender

We have a simple rule in our kitchen: if we buy a new piece of equipment, something has to go.

We go a long way with good knives and a couple decent pots, and we don't use many gadgets. But I do like my immersion blender, and have been using it for over ten years. 

I can make a creamy soup in a few minutes from ingredients in the freezer:

Stock (see previous post)
Mirepoix (see previous post)
Leftover roasted vegetables (e.g., carrots, sweet potatoes, squash)
A spoonful of tomato paste (for acid, color, umami)
Salt and pepper

I just heat all this up, then blend right in the pot. The result is better than canned.

I never make the same soup twice. For example, spices, or fresh ginger (stored in the freezer), or garlic move the soup around the world.

Other dishes I make with the immersion blender include eggplant dip and a surprisingly good banana chocolate "ice cream." The "ice cream" is actually:

Bananas, a little past their prime, saved in the freezer, thawed slightly
A couple good heaps of cocoa powder
A small amount of milk to help everything to grip while it is being blended

Cleanup is minimal compared to the mess made transferring liquids to a countertop blender.

Mirepoix

I like to cook from scratch, but some days I simply want to assemble previously cooked ingredients.

The solution is to have a selection of "subassembly" ingredients in the freezer. I've written about one of these ingredients: stock. Another is mirepoix.

Freakin' Cheap: Almost-Free Homemade Stock

Risottos, soups, and gravies taste best when they're made with homemade stock. I want to make these dishes quickly, but stock takes a long time to prepare. My solution is to make stock in bulk and freeze it.

My stock is basic, and varies from batch to batch depending on ingredients on hand. It provides a foundation of flavor and body.

I don't buy any of the ingredients specifically for stock, and I try to make the preparation as unfussy as possible.

Afraid of Eggplant No More

This is the best time of year for eggplant (aubergines) in Minnesota.

Several varieties of locally grown eggplant were available at my coop today, including usually hard-to-find Indian ("baby") eggplant and a long, skinny Asian variety. I was set on making Eggplant Parmigiana, so I chose the most common type: the large, dark ones.

Once upon a time the thought of cooking eggplant intimidated me. I never seemed to get it right, ending up with a greasy, unevenly textured dish.

Then I learned a method that has worked every time. The resulting dish is not greasy and is consistently tender with no tough bits. The secret is the initial preparation.

Zen and the Art of Casserole Assembly

Oh, the things I wish I'd known when I was young.

Take the ingredients for a basic bake pictured at the top of this post. They look simple enough but for me they represent small lessons learned over decades.

Kale Chronicles

We grew kale this summer, so it has been our default vegetable for the past month.

Kale is extraordinarily easy to prepare. Here's a 20-second video (my first cooking show) showing how to quickly remove the stem and break up the leaf, all without the use of tools.