Cooking tips and trips

In my household, I have some very fussy eaters. Here are a few tricks I use to get by. I hope they help in your home as well.

o When I’m frying corned beef, I like to sprinkle a little sugar on it and mix it in. It adds some extra flavour.

o When I’m making pasta salad, I get complaints when I add my chopped pepper and onions, which is a must for good flavour. So, what I do is put my mayonnaise, peppers, onions, garlic and a little water in my blender or food processor and make a seasoned paste. It really brings out all the flavours as well.{{more}}

o My morning coffee is a must, but I don’t always have flavoured coffee creamer. So, I add a few drops of vanilla essence to my cup and it becomes instant vanilla flavoured coffee. I tried it with the mixed essence, but I must say it was not to my liking.

o I love the sweet and salt combinations, so, I add any leftover meat (KFC, baked chicken, ham, steak) to my pancake batter. Just mix the batter as directed and add the chopped meat and fry on low heat. Makes for a great omelet as well.

o Take any type of hotdogs that you have and slice them up. Fry over medium heat, then add some ketchup and a dash of curry and fry until the ketchup has lightly caramelized and is sticking to the hotdogs.

o If you don’t have honey barbecue sauce, you can add some honey, sugar, or even maple syrup to your regular barbecue sauce for that instant sweetness.

o The quickest salad dressing you can make is by mixing some mayonnaise with a little ketchup. It sounds weird, but my husband told me about this and I must admit it’s rather nice.

o Use oil on the surface when you are going to place dough to raise or to be rolled. It prevents it from sticking. You can rub some on your rolling pin and hands as well.

o Embrace your freezer. I like to put my onions and peppers in the freezer so they don’t spoil. This way, you can use them whenever you want and they dissolve faster when cooked. This does not hinder the flavour in any way. Just make sure to use a Ziploc bag. My kids tend to leave half-eaten yogurt, so I pour it into a plastic cup with a plastic spoon and make yogurt popsicles. If you keep adding to it as it freezes, you will have multi-flavour popsicles. To preserve my fruits, I peel and seed them and place them in bags, so I will have them for my smoothies when the fruit may be out of season.