Innehållsförteckning för July/August 2021 från Cook's Illustrated

Last summer, with time at home on my hands, I tried growing my own tomatoes. I carefully arranged the plants on my porch to net an ideal 8 hours of sunlight; lavished them with water; and even spent the requisite time worrying about their nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium needs. As I waited for the fruits to come thick and fast, I dreamed of tomato sandwiches on griddled white bread, big batches of pasta sauce, and cooling bowls of creamy gazpacho andaluz. In short, I put in the work. My reward? Three ruddy-orange specimens (I planted a red variety) so firm that they could have survived international shipping. I’ve always marveled at those who can coax deliciousness from little more than seed, soil, and sunlight, and my respect for their talent…

I like the drama of an upside-down tart. The most famous example is a tarte Tatin, which consists of apples that are cooked in a caramel in a skillet; topped with pastry; baked; and inverted so that the pastry base wears the gleaming, deeply bronzed apple crown. It’s a treat that can’t help but impress. The framework has been adapted to seasonal fruits such as peaches, plums, and pears. So why not tomatoes? The bright, savory-sweet fruit would pair naturally with buttery pastry, and by adding components such as herbs and aromatics to a less-sweet stand-in for the caramel, I could easily shift my iteration from the traditional dessert squarely into savory territory. The Building Blocks Plenty of upside-down tarts use store-bought puff pastry, and I saw no reason not…

Unless you’re aiming for a specific regional style or flavor profile, you don’t need a recipe to grill steak. It’s a core technique, like making a pan sauce or sauteing a piece of fish, and once you know the basic tenets and visual indicators that guide you along the way, you can apply them to just about any cut and expect well seasoned, evenly rosy meat encased in a thick, deeply browned crust. The following guidelines—culled from nearly three decades of test kitchen steak cookery and research—will help you achieve that ideal every time. After a few rounds of practice, you might even have them committed to memory. 1 Choose a Good Cut Beefy flavor and tenderness are the goals for any steak. In general, you get what you pay…

During a typical Sicilian summer, the temperature starts to soar as soon as the sun rises. That’s why the islanders’ favorite way to wake up is also a means of cooling down: An icy dish of granita alongside fresh brioche col tuppo is a traditional breakfast. Many take their morning scoop coffee-flavored; others opt for a pistachio-, almond-, or fruit-based version (lemon, mulberry, and peach are popular) piled with whipped cream and washed down with a shot of espresso. I can’t think of a better way to start the day. No matter when you choose to indulge (granita is also enjoyed as an afternoon snack), one of the best things about this frozen treat is that it comes together with very little effort, and no special equipment is required. Just…

How to Make Achiote Oil Achiote (often called annatto) is the ruddy-colored seed of a tree native to Central and South America and an essential ingredient in Latin American cooking. (It’s also used in Asian countries, including Vietnam and the Philippines.) The seeds are covered in a waxy coating full of pigments. When pulverized to a powder, made into a paste, or infused into oil, achiote can bring subtle earthy flavor to all sorts of sauces, marinades, stews, rices, and spice rubs, all the while tinting food a beautiful yellowy orange. For simplicity, we opted for the preground spice to make Puerto Rico’s all-purpose dry seasoning sazón (see recipe, opposite page), which goes into the rub for our Grilled Chicken with Adobo and Sazón (page 5). But it couldn’t be…

Utensil Crocks Utensil crocks keep our most-used cooking tools conveniently accessible and organized. We’ve all tried to pull out a utensil only to have others come tumbling out in a tangled mess, or we’ve had a utensil crock, top-heavy from its contents, wobble as we added or retrieved utensils. We wondered if there were utensil crocks on the market that could solve these problems. We tested nine crocks, priced from about $14 to about $50, in a variety of sizes and materials. We liked a few of the crocks we tested, but the Circulon Ceramic Tool Crock (model 47581) outperformed the rest. Round, with an opening measuring 6_inches across, it was spacious enough to hold 20 utensils. We loved its removable divider, which split the interior into three equal sections…

Expand Your Dish-Drying Space Large cookware can quickly overload a countertop dish rack. When Arlene Lighthall of Del Mar, Calif., has an empty dishwasher and lots of pots and pans to dry, she uses the dishwasher racks as extra draining space. A No-Spray Way to Juice Citrus When he’s juicing citrus, Nick Martellacci of Brooklyn, N.Y., holds his reamer over a funnel set inside a jar. The funnel helps send the juice straight into the jar, preventing it from spraying out onto the counter. Serving Vessel for Ice-Cold Oysters When he’s serving oysters on the half shell, Dan Murrey of Asheville, N.C., arranges a bed of crushed ice on a wire rack set in a roasting pan and then arranges the shellfish on top. This way, the melting ice drips…

When I was a child, my mom often made what we called “cream corn soup” as a quick, belly warming supplement to go along with our usual meals of rice and stir-fries. Like many immigrant Chinese cooks who prepared similar versions of this dish, she would crack open a can of cream-style corn and heat it in a pot with some water before stirring in a beaten egg that would set into wispy threads suspended in the silky, viscous liquid. At the table, we’d pass around the white pepper to shake on as much as we liked. The dish came together in minutes, nearly as easy to prepare as the Campbell’s condensed chicken noodle soup that shared space in our pantry with the fleet of canned corn. “The Chinese cook…

At its best, a mandoline allows cooks to slice fruit and vegetables much more precisely, consistently, and quickly than they could with a chef’s knife. Some models have attachments that allow you to julienne foods or make waffle cuts as well. Used properly—and safely—the mandoline can be a magical device, turning out produce that looks like it’s been cut by a chef from a three-star restaurant, and in record time. But all too often, these tools disappoint us; they cut poorly, skid around, or are just plain dangerous to use. We wanted to know which mandolines were best, so we bought eight models, priced from about $24 to about $200, and put them to the test, using them to slice tomatoes, potatoes, fennel, beets, and eggplant and (where applicable) to…

My Puerto Rican grandmother had a metric for the chicken she marinated in the island’s garlicky wet adobo and roasted for Sunday supper: It had to be so saturated with sabor, or flavor, that you’d even nibble at the bones. She’d pound together loads of fresh garlic, salt, black pepper, oregano, and some vinegar and oil; dab the creamy paste onto her pinkie; and stick it in my mouth—her way of weaning me onto its heady bite. Evidently, it worked, because growing up I’d crave the flavor of that chicken adobo more than any other dish save for one—the version my parents made by translating my grandmother’s formula to the grill. They’d marinate breasts and leg quarters in the same garlicky paste and take them to church barbecues in the…

In the early 1800s salt was scarce, even along Italy’s southern coast. So hungry fishermen came up with a “crazy”—and frugal—idea: stewing their catch in seawater. That’s just one story behind pesce all’acqua pazza (“fish in crazy water”), which, over time, evolved considerably into a dish featuring firm-fleshed white fish cooked in a tomato-studded, garlic-infused broth. To learn more about acqua pazza, I consulted naturalist and Italian food authority Eugenia Bone. Interestingly, her exceedingly simple formula was nearly identical to that of another source I queried, my Sicilian friend Vito Aluia, an accomplished cook. We prepared his family recipe together: Warm garlic in olive oil; add water, salt, tomato, and parsley; and then gently poach whole whiting—an inexpensive fish with sweet, mild flesh—in the seasoned liquid until it turns opaque.…

When I was a kid, my family made lemonade the old-fashioned way: We fetched a small cardboard canister from the freezer, peeled away the plastic tab, pried off the lid, and squeezed until a semisolid cylinder of concentrate dropped into the waiting pitcher with a satisfying schloop. After whisking in three cans’ worth of water, we were ready to pour it over ice and enjoy. I was nearly an adult before I learned that there are methods for making lemonade that involve fresh fruit, and that good from-scratch versions boast a sweet-sour balance and faint bitterness that make lemonade not just refreshing but also complex. But until recently, I’d never made a batch that delivered on that nuance. Most of my previous attempts tasted either one-dimensional or excessively bitter. It…

VEGITABLE OIL Best For: Baking, sautéing, and frying. “Vegetable oil” is a generic term that encompasses any edible oil made from plant sources, including nuts, seeds, grains, beans, and olives. Cooking oils labeled “vegetable oil” are usually made from soybeans, but they can also be made from other substances or a blend of several. Most commercially available vegetable oils have been refined, bleached, and deodorized so that they have a neutral flavor and high smoking point. CORN OIL Best For: Frying and baking. Compounds in corn oil can taste sour at room temperature, as when used in mayonnaise or dressings. When heated, these same compounds change for the better, so food fried in corn oil tastes great. EXTRA-VIRGIN OLIVE OIL Best For: Sautéing, dressings, and finishing dishes. Extra-virgin olive oil,…

How to Use a Mandoline with Confidence Mandolines (see our new favorites, the Super Benriner Mandoline Slicer and the OXO Good Grips Chef’s Mandoline Slicer 2.0, on page 25) can precisely slice food in record time, but the combination of sharp blades and moving food makes some cooks hesitant to use this tool. These best practices will help you stay safe and feel confident slicing. –M.B. 1 Work on a Flat, Dry Surface: This ensures that the mandoline will sit securely on the countertop. 2 Use the Hand Guard (If It’s Sturdy): A good hand guard holds food securely and advances it easily through the blade with little waste. 3 Consider a Cut-Resistant Glove: If your mandoline’s hand guard is flimsy and ineffective, use a cut-resistant glove to put a…